
Glass. 
Book. 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



ANSON BURLINGAME 

AND THE FIRST 
CHINESE MISSION TO FOREIGN POWERS 



ANSON BURLINGAME 

AND THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 
TO FOREIGN POWERS 



BY 

FREDERICK WELLS WILLIAMS 

Assistant Professor of Oriental History in Yale University 



NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

1912 



o 



/X . 



COPYEIGHT, 1912, BT 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
Published September, 1912 




gCLA32052i ' ft_ 

7k) J. 



PREFACE 

This is a study of a career and of an enter- 
prise that were misconstrued by their own gen- 
eration. They demand requital from generations 
that are to come. As a romance in the stirring 
period of American history the hfe of Anson 
Burhngame deserves a biographer capable of 
giving its epic movement lasting literary form. 
My purpose in these pages has been less ambi- 
tious. So far as the character of the man is con- 
cerned I have tried to show that it was justly 
estimated by few even of those who admired him; 
that the work he set out to perform was left un- 
completed but did not end in failure. Yet the 
real importance of Anson Burlingame lies not so 
much in the man or in the endeavour as in the 
use of an idea which he made the guiding prin- 
ciple of his service abroad. He believed in the 
practical application to the business of diplo- 
macy of one of those commandments upon which 
hang all the law and the prophets: "Thou shalt 
love thy neighbour as thyself." With this pre- 
cept in control I have endeavoured to show how 



vi PREFACE 

he secured first a hearing, then attention, and 
at last the conversion of the most disdainful 
group of civilised officials in Asia. Once won 
to a belief in his adherence to the Confucian 
maxim of trying to place one's self in the other 
side's position, these self-opinioned statesmen 
determined to engage his co-operation in setting 
their country right before the world, while they 
addressed themselves to the herculean labour 
of bringing a recreant court to reason and of 
leading the Chinese Empire out of its isolation. 
The far-reaching wisdom of the Burlingame 
policy of awaiting a natural reversal in China 
instead of pressing her refractory people by 
force of arms is acknowledged by the great 
powers to-day. As a policy it appears to be the 
only provident prophylaxis against the evils 
involved in the alternative of interference and 
subjection. Fifty years ago, when the white 
man recognised no limit to the prevalence of 
newly perfected weapons which he alone em- 
ployed, this was not generally perceived. With 
such advantages on their side it was natural 
that representatives of the Western world should 
clamour for a physical conquest that seemed 
easily within their reach. I have tried to treat 



PREFACE vil 

the exponents of this element of our own civili- 
sation with justice and even with consideration. 
It has been shown, I think, that their attitude 
was the same among all the Nationals repre- 
sented in the Far East. But the fact must not 
be obscured that the cupidity of this group of 
foreigners, when alarmed for the safety of their 
commercial profits, was the chief cause of the 
defeat of the Burlingame doctrine and its rele- 
gation for a generation to the limbo of exploded 
theories. 

The begetter of this great idea has suffered 
in reputation under its eclipse. A worse thing 
has befallen. Though his plan has been re- 
vived the dignity of his name has never been 
vindicated. His idea has become the professed 
policy of the nations during China's present 
turmoil, but his clear right to its authorship 
and the splendid spontaneity of his champion- 
ship of a discredited people in the hour of their 
abasement has been obscured and even denied. 
It was he who first declared abroad the neces- 
sity of assisting China to find herself, and of 
elevating the diplomacy of Western powers in 
Asia to something higher than securing for their 
traders the largest possible advantages in a sec- 



viii PREFACE 

ular struggle for profits. He recognised, what 
the merchants themselves could not compre- 
hend, that there was danger to China in sum- 
marily accepting the materialism of the West; 
and danger to China meant and still means the 
cancellation of every political equation in the 
arrangement of civilised society. In this sense 
it appears to me that Mr. Burlingame can 
properly be called the father of the open-door 
principle which Mr. Hay proposed as a symbol 
for the unification of outside interests when 
China threatened, in a moment of aberration, 
to become a derelict among nations. 

The power of urbanity, its importance as 
an' international asset, especially when dealing 
with exotic peoples, is not sufiiciently realised 
by Western states. Mr. Burlingame's credit in 
China, secured by the exercise of his unfailing 
courtesy, needs to be studied as a lesson by the 
men of our race. His personal popularity was 
too lightly dismissed by his countrymen as a 
thing apart from the real work of diplomacy; his 
affability and his enthusiasm led them to under- 
rate a quick inventive brain. And while he was 
not taken seriously enough by contemporaries 
during life, after his untimely death he was dis- 



PREFACE ix 

credited by a suddenly aroused fear of Chinese 
immigration associated with his treaty, and 
loaded with obloquy by orators of the sand-lot 
type. Those who had submitted to the persua- 
sive spell of his eloquence forgot then the pur- 
port of his great idea. He had published noth- 
ing, therefore it had no visible expression in print 
and was only to be found buried among official 
documents. For these reasons, therefore, the 
significance of his demeanour has been forgot- 
ten, the true value of his work effaced. But now 
that the antagonisms of the past are allayed he 
should be returned to our knowledge and his 
purpose of peace and goodwill, his lofty prin- 
ciple of forbearance, and his method of perse- 
vering suavity appreciated. 

It is time to disabuse ourselves of the notion 
that the Chinese are a stupid and unchangeable 
folk because they have evolved a philosophy of 
life that, unlike our own, does not find its su- 
premest satisfaction in wealth and in war. We 
must credit them with intellectual powers that 
only need proper direction to accomplish great 
things. If they erred in the past through exces- 
sive caution they promise in the near future to 
make good any defect of this sort by too great 



X PREFACE 

temerity in change. The ejffect of any untoward 
transition in an enormous mass of people pos- 
sessing the quahties of the Chinese cannot be 
disregarded by intelhgent minds. Mr. Burhn- 
i game understood the risks involved both to oth- 
ers and to themselves in such a lapse; and to 
the welfare of the Christian world as well as to 
the task of serving China in the interests of her 
own revival he gave his heart and soul with a 
devotion that ended in the sacrifice of his life. 
As an embodiment of the true missionary spirit 
he stands among the foremost public men of his 
generation, and it is a spirit which is still effi- 
cient. Professor William Garrott Brown has ad- 
mirably appraised the influence thus cut short 
but not concluded: "If Burlingame's name be 
not forever associated with an epochal readjust- 
ment of the world's civilisations, then few names 
have missed immortality more narrowly." ^ 

New Haven, Connecticut, 
August, 1912. 

1 Atlantic Monthly, June, 1905, p. 32. 



CONTENTS 



FAQB 



The Evolution of a Diplomatist . . 3 

The Genesis of the Mission .... 73 

The Mission in America 113 

The Clarendon Letter and British 

Policy 161 

The Opposition in China 192 

The End of the Mission 230 

Appendices 273 

Bibliography 359 

Index 367 



ANSON BUELINGAME 

AND THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION TO 
FOREIGN POWERS 



ANSON BURLINGAME 

AND THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION TO 
FOREIGN POWERS 



THE EVOLUTION OF A DIPLOMATIST 

yl NSON BURLINGAME was pre-eminently 
A\ a man of his generation in America. 
From both Hneage and training he de- 
rived qualities that in his maturity revealed him 
as a product of the formative period when the 
United States was passing from the position 
of a remote agricultural community to assume, 
through expansion of territory and the develop- 
ment of its natural resources, a place among the 
great nations of the world. Like most of the 
men who became leaders in this timet of transi- 
tion, he was descended from the early English 
settlers in America, inheriting from that sturdy 
stock a temper which made for independence 
in action and ideas. His ancestors, who first 
came in the Puritan period to Rhode Island, 
had their share in the French-Indian War on 
this continent, and subsequently fought in the 



4 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

War of American Independence, his mother's 
grandfather being Colonel Israel Angell, of Wash- 
ington's army. The son of Joel Burlingame, a 
settler and farmer on the frontier, he was born 
in New Berlin, Chenango County, New York, 
November 14, 1820. Before he was three years 
old his father removed to Seneca County, Ohio, 
to occupy a farm in what was, a century ago, 
the forest country of the Western Reserve. Joel 
Burlingame is described by one of his neighbours 
there as "a devout Methodist, an earnest free- 
mason, a school teacher, ambitious but impracti- 
cable. He spent his time attending two-day meet- 
ings, quarterly meetings, and camp-meetings, and 
had little love for the hard work required to 
improve a farm in the wilderness. He was a 
man of fine personal appearance, and his gen- 
eral knowledge and fine conversational powers 
gave him favour in every cabin, while his ve- 
hement prayers and eloquent exhortations gave 
him notoriety among the pioneer Christians. I 
think he was instrumental in building the first 
school, as I know he was active in the erection 
of the first church in Seneca County." ^ 

Anson is described by the same writer, who 
was his playmate in these early days, as "hand- 

^ "Personal Recollections of Anson Burlingame," by General W. H. 
Gibson, in the Toledo Commercial, March 1, 1870. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 5 

some, jolly, and lovable in childhood, as he was 
earnest, energetic, and devoted in manhood. 
The first ten years generally determine future 
character. Anson Burlingame during these 
years was a poor boy surrounded by Christian 
influences and guided by the spirit of a father 
full of love toward God and all men. In recur- 
ring to these days I am unable to recall a single 
act of meanness, unkindness, or cruelty on the 
part of little Anson." A boy of his genia^l yet 
ardent temperament would readily become the 
companion of such a father — whose predilection 
for preaching was not, however, unaccompanied 
by an appreciation of discipline which restrained 
that companion from going wild. The youth par- 
ticipated in various expeditions about Lake Su- 
perior and the upper Mississippi, some of them 
made for purposes of surveying in the Northwest 
Territory, and others to negotiate compacts with 
the Indians beyond the border. His schooling, 
therefore, was supplemented by a close com- 
panionship with nature and with men. When 
the family removed to Detroit he attended the 
academy in that town, and subsequently the 
Branch University of Michigan, located in the 
county of that name, where he chiefly shone 
in lyceum debates. 

The attraction of a professional career in 



6 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

which he might exercise mental powers that 
were distinctly above the average brought him 
in 1843 to the Harvard Law School, from which 
he was graduated as Bachelor in 1846. He 
began at once to practise at the Massachusetts 
bar in association with an older partner, Mr. 
Briggs,^ and, already confident of support from 
the friends he had made in Boston, entered im- 
mediately into the public life of the city of his 
adoption. He rose rapidly to local prominence 
as a ready speaker, and became through this 
gift a political factor of importance in the State. 
These were the palmy days of stump oratory in 
America, when some reputation for eloquence 
was deemed essential to political success. 
Amongst the multitude of vigorous orators it 
required ability of a high order to be recognised 
as the spokesman of a party on the platform. 
*'It was the magnetism of Mr. Burlingame," 
wrote Mr. Blaine, who first knew him at this 
period, "that made him pre-eminently effective 
before an assemblage of the people. What we 
mean precisely by magnetism it might be diffi- 
cult to define, but it is undoubtedly true that 

1 A son of George Nixon Briggs, who, after serving six terms in 
Congress, was elected seven times successively (1843-50) governor of 
Massachusetts. He wus the " Governor B." of the " Biglow Papers," who 

"is a sensible man; 
He stays to his home an' looks arter his folks." 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 7 

/ 
Mr. Burlingame possessed an immense reserve 

of that subtle, forceful, overwhelming power 
which the word magnetism is used to signify. 
. . . What he believed he believed with such 
intensity, what he spoke he spoke with such 
fervour, that the unbidden impulse was to be- 
lieve and assent to be convinced." ^ 

A leader by force of character as well as of per- 
sonal attraction, he was made president of the 
Young Men's Whig Republican Association, and 
thus early connected with a political group which 
he consistently supported to the end of his career. 
It was a notable triumph of personality over di- 
verse elements of opposition, for this association 
was composed of two incongruous components 
— the "North Enders," the most obstreperous 
campaigners of Boston, who were bitterly hostile 
to "high-brow" domination in politics, and a 
small but eminent band of Whigs belonging to the 
aristocratic class, whose opinions were at vari- 
ance with those of their kind. From the time 
of his marriage, in 1847, with Miss Livermore, a 
member of one of the old Cambridge families, he 
began to make his way into the influential ele- 
ment of the community, amongst whom he made 
many enduring friendships. But his political 

1 James G. Blaine, "Mr. Burlingame as an Orator," Atlantic Monthly, 
November, 1870. 



8 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

battles were fought against the majority of these 
conservatives, and in aUiance with a few who, 
Hke Sumner, Dana, and the older Charles Francis 
Adams, had resolutely abandoned that company 
to join the Free Soil party. That he should end 
by becoming the accredited representative of 
those who began by violently opposing his ideas 
was a presage of the kind of success against great 
odds he achieved in after life, the significance of 
which is not only personal but moral. After re- 
turning from a trip to Europe, in 1852, he was 
elected to the State senate, where his chief act, 
characteristic of his independent spirit, was his 
opposition to the Maine liquor law in defiance 
of the platform of the party that elected him. 
In the following year he became a member of the 
convention for revising the State constitution. 
The reputation he gained in this body secured 
for him a nomination by the American party 
and an election to Congress. 

In his three successive terms as congressman 
he served on the committee on foreign affairs, 
but his chief claim to distinction was his rec- 
ognised place among the foremost anti-slavery 
controvertists in the House. His famous achieve- 
ment was a speech entitled "A Defence of Mas- 
sachusetts," pronounced June 21, 1856. The 
incident inspiring it was one of the most dra- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 9 

matic in the history of our national legislature. 
Senator Sumner, a month before this date, had 
addressed the Senate upon the Kansas Resolu- 
tion in a speech the virulence of which, rather 
than its trenchant argument, exasperated the 
Southern members beyond endurance. Unable 
to await a reply in kind, a congressman, Preston 
Brooks, a kinsman of Andrew Pickens Butler, 
senator from South Carolina, — one of the Dem- 
ocrats upon whom Sumner had poured the acid 
accumulation of his contumely, — undertook the 
task of vindicating the honour of his family and 
State by entering the Senate chamber when the 
Massachusetts statesman was engrossed in writ- 
ing at his desk, and beating him senseless with 
a stick. An intimate defended the champion 
from interruption, while the few senators present, 
all Southern men, delicately refrained from dis- 
turbing the assailant until his victim fell help- 
less to the floor. It was thought at first that 
Sumner's extraordinary physique might be equal 
to sustaining without grave danger an assault 
which in the case of an ordinary man would have 
been an assassination; but after some days the 
spine was found to have been injured. Four 
years passed before he regained vigour suf- 
ficient to enable him to resume his seat in the 
chamber. 



10 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

The Northern States, and especially their rep- 
resentatives in Congress, were naturally indig- 
nant at the outrage. It is but slight palliation 
to the sensitive patriot to be told that this was 
the single instance in which the courtesies of 
Congress were violated during the trying decade 
before our Civil War;^ but the rough-hewn 
nature of our social behaviour at that period 
is revealed, and the arbitrary character of the 
"Southern oligarchy" appraised, by the fact that 
the House failed to expel Brooks for his ruflSanly 
conduct and murderous intention, and no other 
power on earth could punish this stark assassin. 
It is a sufficient commentary upon the culture 
and condition of South Carolina to add that, 
upon resigning his seat, he was justified in the 
opinion of his native State by being immedi- 
ately returned by a unanimous vote to Congress. 
As spokesman for outraged Massachusetts, Mr. 
Burhngame was admirably fitted both by tem- 
per and ability. Upon rising, after Brooks's re- 

i"The Sumner assault became a leading event in the great slavery 
contest between North and South. ... In result the incident was ex- 
tremely damaging to the South, for it tended more than any single 
border-ruffian crime in Kansas to unite hesitating and wavering opinion 
in the North against the alarming flood of lawlessness and violence 
which as a rule found its origin and its defence in the pro-slavery party. 
Certainly no phase of the transaction was received with such popular 
favour as some of the bolder avowals by the Northern representatives 
of their readiness to fight, and especially by Burlingame's actual accept- 
ance of the challenge by Brooks." (Hay and Nicolay, "Abraham 
Lincoln," vol. II, p. 55.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 11 

turn to the House, to denounce the mahgnant 
spirit which had usurped the place of reason in 
the South, he assailed the record of South Caro- 
lina with vehemence fairly supported by historic 
fact, and concluded in a burst of old-fashioned 
eloquence which served its turn many years 
thereafter as a favourite piece for declamation 
in the schools of the North. 

So much for the occasion of the speech. A word, 
and I shall be pardoned, about the speaker himself. 
He is my friend; for many and many a year I have 
looked to him for guidance and light, and I never 
looked in vain; he never had a personal enemy in 
his life; his character is as pure as the snow that falls 
on his native hills; his heart overflows with kind- 
ness for every being having the upright form of man; 
he is a ripe scholar, a chivalric gentleman, and a 
warm-hearted, true friend. He sat at the feet of 
Channing and drank in the sentiments of that noble 
soul. He bathed in the learning and undying love 
of the great jurist, Story; and the hand of Jackson, 
with its honours and its offices, sought him early in 
life, but he shrank from them with instinctive mod- 
esty. Sir, he is the pride of Massachusetts. His 
mother Commonwealth found him adorning the 
highest walks of literature and law, and she bade 
him go and grace somewhat the rough character of 
political life. The people of Massachusetts — the 
old and the young and the middle-aged — now pay 
their full homage to the beauty of his public and 
private character. 

Such is Charles Sumner. On the twenty-second 



n ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

day of May, when the Senate and the House had 
clothed themselves in mourning for a brother fallen 
in the battle of life in the distant State of Missouri, 
the senator from Massachusetts sat in the silence of 
the Senate chamber, engaged in the employments 
appertaining to his office, when a member from this 
House, who had taken an oath to sustain the Con- 
stitution, stole into the Senate, that place which 
had hitherto been held sacred against violence, and 
smote him as Cain smote his brother. . . . Sir, the 
act was brief, and my comments on it shall be brief 
also. I denounce it in the name of the sovereignty 
of Massachusetts, which was stricken down by the 
blow. I denounce it in the name of humanity. I 
denounce it in the name of that fair play which 
bullies and prize-fighters respect. What! strike a 
man when he is pinioned — when he cannot respond 
to a blow! Call you that chivalry.? In what code 
of honour did you get your authority for that.? I 
do not believe that member has a friend so dear 
who must not, in his heart of hearts, condemn the 
act.^ 

1 The speech was reprinted for private distribution in Cambridge, 
1856. Senator Wilson, Sumner's colleague in the Senate, writes of the 
assault: "Standing as it does in its relation to the irrepressible conflict 
between freedom and slavery, it was a revelation of a state of feeling 
and sentiment, especially at the South, which both startled and surprised 
the nation and the world, though it has since lost much of its special 
significance looked at by the side of the more horrible demonstrations 
of rebellion and civil war. Thus considered it shows Mr. Brooks as 
only a fit representative of the dominating influences of the slave- 
holding States, where not only did their leading men and presses indorse 
the deed as their own, and defend it by voice and vote, but the people 
generally seemed ready to vie with each other in their professed admira- 
tion of his course." ("Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America," 
II, p. 484. See also Rhodes's "History of the United States," II, pp. 
145-7, and Pierce, "Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner," Boston, 
1893, vol. Ill, pp. 460-524, a most detailed account.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 13 

Brooks, who had in vain challenged Senator 
Wilson for calling the assault "brutal, murder- 
ous, and cowardly," took action at once after 
Burlingame's speech, and was met by a prompt 
acceptance of his challenge, the latter proposing 
rifles as weapons and Deer Island, near Niagara 
Falls, as the place of meeting. The chivalry of 
the South recoiled at the suggestion of such 
instruments of precision on the field of honour, 
and "Bully" Brooks declined to meet his op- 
ponent, on the ground that to reach the place 
designated he would have to travel "through the 
enemy's country." He was glorified for months 
thereafter by complimentary banquets and pres- 
ents of various kinds of clubs suitably inscribed.^ 

Mr. Burlingame was returned with increased 
prestige to the Thirty-fifth and Thirty-sixth 
Congresses during the administration of Pres- 
ident Buchanan, but failed in securing a re- 
election in 1860, though ardently supporting Lin- 
coln and his triumphant party by speeches in 
the campaign. As a reward for faithful political 

^ Both Brooks and Butler died within a year of this incident, the 
former confessing to a friend that he was "heartsick of being the recog- 
nised representative of bulUes, the recipient of their ostentatious gifts 
and officious testimonials of admiration and regard." A detailed account 
of the challenge, by Colonel James, Mr. Burlingame's second, was given 
to the Washington Post, October 27, 1901, by W. A. Crofutt, and is to 
be found in full in John Bigelow's "Retrospections of an Active Life," 
vol. I, pp. 165-170. It is the most authoritative document on the 
subject. 



14 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

service he received an appointment as minister 
to Austria, but learned while in Paris on his 
way to Vienna that the Austrian court objected 
to him as too outspoken a champion of Kossuth 
and of Sardinian independence^ to be persona 
grata at that capital. The Chinese legation 
being offered, he at once accepted the post, 
probably with rather vague ideas as to the past 
history of that country, and some doubts as to 
whether he should even be allowed to reside in 
its capital when he reached it. 

China in 1861 was suffering from the twofold 
affliction of a rebellion at home and a recent 
defeat of her army by foreign invaders before 
Peking. The latter war had opened her capital 
for the first time in the history of the empire to 
the permanent residence of Western plenipo- 
tentiaries, but there remained a desperate hope 
in the hearts of the Chinese that these might 
still be induced to remove in time to the treaty 
ports; the initial step in Mr. Burlingame's 
programme was to establish an American lega- 
tion there upon the basis of conventions secured 
by Great Britain and France. Owing to the 
fearful disasters of the Tai-ping Insurrection 
during ten years, and the strain upon their re- 

^ He had moved while in Congress the recognition of Sardinia as a 
first-class power. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 15 

sources from the presence of the rebels in the 
provinces of the Yangtse, the government of 
China was sufficiently alarmed at the critical 
condition of the ruling dynasty to treat the 
foreigners with circumspection and, for the 
time at least, carry out the terms of the treaties 
with honesty and faithfulness.^ It reflects credit 
upon the spirit of the Tartar clan ruling an alien 
and discontented people that, despite its deca- 
dence and loss of morale after two centuries of 
occupation, it should have faced the diverse 
evils of this crisis with determination and with- 
out a suggestion of surrender. The plight of 
the dynasty was relieved by the death of its 
dissipated and cowardly monarch, Hsien-feng, 
in August, 1861, during his flight to Jehol from 
the Europeans, when the government came 
into the hands of his infant son, T'ung-chih, 
controlled by the two Empresses-Dowager and 
Prince Kung, a brother of the deceased sover- 
eign. From what has lately been made known 
of her career it appears that the dangerous situ- 
ation was met by the secondary wife, Tsz-hsi, the 

^Besides the Tai-ping, or Chang-mao, "long-haired," rebels who held 
Nanking as their capital, there were at this time the so-called Pathan, 
or Moslem, insurrection devastating Yunnan, other Mohammedan re- 
volts in the north-west,— which a little later carried away the whole 
region from Kansu westward to Kashgaria in a revolt that was not 
suppressed until 1881, — and an uprising of bandits called Nien-fei in 
Shantung. 



16 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

actual mother of the Emperor, then in her 
twenty-seventh year, who, with that extraor- 
dinary perception in the choice of her agents 
which distinguishes great rulers everywhere, 
made common cause with Prince Kung against 
a palace clique opposed to her interests, and 
brought the baby sovereign back to Peking to 
govern under a regency. It has been the cus- 
tom in Western accounts of this woman to call 
her wanton and cruel. Personally she seems to 
have been quite the reverse, though as indiffer- 
ent to human life when her own interests were 
critically involved as are all Asiatics. The su- 
preme obstacle to a fair exercise of her excep- 
tional ability was her utter ignorance of the 
outside world, the inevitable result of a tradi- 
tional policy of the Manchu dynasty, carefully 
fostered by astute Chinese officials, who tried 
thereby during the nineteenth century to re- 
duce the princes to impotence and to control 
the empire for their own selfish exploitation. 
The Empress was never easily deceived in mat- 
ters which came within the compass of her own 
observation, but it was not difficult to play 
upon her pride of race or upon the anxieties 
she ever entertained as to intrigues menacing 
her supremacy within the palace. From such 
motives she would occasionally visit the greatest 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 17 

statesmen in the land with sudden and terrible 
punishment, announced in astounding bursts of 
passion that recall stories of Elizabeth of Eng- 
land. Yet her judgment was rarely long at 
fault, if ever it really failed, and unless misled 
by misapprehension of the facts relating to 
European interests and affairs, — a misappre- 
hension which seemed to Europeans themselves 
so unaccountable that they refused to credit its 
reality, — she faced the appalling difficulties sur- 
rounding her with bravery and sense. 

Prince Kung, after his experience in conclud- 
ing the conventions of 1860 with Great Britain 
and France, appears to have wisely decided 
that the safety of his country depended upon a 
conciliatory policy as to Europeans, so long, at 
least, as China was weakened by open rebellions 
in more than half her provinces. In carrying 
out his plan of maintaining a consistently cor- 
rect attitude toward all foreigners, there was no 
evidence of cordiality in his conduct, or of a 
conviction, like that of the Japanese under sim- 
ilar circumstances, that China might profit by 
assimilating certain elements of Western cul- 
ture. Yet, even thus conditioned, he was the 
liberal partner in the executive, though rather a 
moderating than an active force. Had he pos- 
sessed the political ability of his great ancestors 



18 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Kang-lisi and Chien-lung, he might, perhaps, 
have converted the Empresses-Dowager to a 
poHcy that could well have saved his country 
the humiliations of 1895 and 1900. His less 
famous colleague, Wen-siang, was a Manchu of 
greater energy and broader intellectual grasp, 
who, while at first sharing the hostility of his 
class toward foreigners, presently admitted his 
appreciation of their character and ideas, and 
honestly endeavoured to lead his fellows to 
abandon their prejudices and learn of them.^ 

In estimating the attitude of the Western en- 
voys toward these men, it must be remembered 
that at this time none of them possessed ade- 
quate or accurate information of the political 
situation in Peking. They groped their way, 
and in the darkness of their ignorance it was a 
genius of shrewdness and common-sense rather 
than diplomatic training which proved to be 

1 Sir Rutherford Alcock described him in a review of the statesmen of 
China at this period as being "by far the most distinguished" of them 
all. "As a member of the Grand Secretariat, and vested with other 
high functions, his influence is very great, both personal and official — 
subject, nevertheless, to such attenuation as the active hostility of a 
very powerful party of anti-foreign functionaries within and without the 
palace can effect. This party, if party that can properly be called 
which is composed of nearly the whole of the educated classes of the 
Empire, — officials, literati, and gentry, — are unceasing in their opposi- 
tion to all progressive measures, whether emanating from the foreign 
board or elsewhere. But Wen-siang is held in especial hatred as the 
known advocate of a policy of progressive improvement with foreign 
aid and appliances." ("Chinese Statesmen and State Papers," I, p. 
333, Erasers Magazine, March, 1871.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 19 

the safest guide. Kung was the first man of 
princely rank with whom foreigners had come 
into personal contact in China, and if, through 
their amity, he could be convinced of the desi- 
rability of closer and more friendly relations in 
the future, they were encouraged to anticipate 
an end to the old attitude of opposition to the 
West following the conversion of the court to a 
policy of free intercourse. They did not then 
realise the unbroken antipathy of the official 
class, nor were they aware that the Chinese 
people as a whole have to be convinced before 
they can be controlled, or that a sudden break 
with the ancient Manchu hermit-nation policy 
required the adhesion of the provincial govern- 
ments before it could be safely effected. If the 
hackneyed but handy means of securing a con- 
cession at the treaty ports, by employing force 
at the locality in issue, was deplorable on moral 
grounds it must be confessed that the alterna- 
tive process of demanding justice from the cap- 
ital was often futile in obtaining its necessary 
enforcement by the educated gentry of the place 
where trouble had arisen. China as a country 
neither liked the intruding foreigner nor feared 
the central authority.^ 

^ The dispatches of Sir Frederick Bruce and Sir R. Alcock discuss the 
politics and statesmen of China at this period with considerable fulness 



20 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

On his arrival by the "overland" steamer in 
October, 1861, Mr. Burlingame found the Amer- 
ican legation in China located in the rented house 
of its charge and secretary, S. W. Williams, in 
the Portuguese settlement of Macao. His de- 
sire to proceed at once to Peking and establish 
the Mission there as soon as possible after the 
other allies of the late war was frustrated by 
the lateness of the season, which made it im- 
possible to reach the capital before the river 
Peiho was frozen over and travel from the coast 
precluded. Until railways were built in China, 
Peking during the winter was almost as secure 
from the intrusion of travellers as Lhassa or 
Timbuctoo. The six months' delay in southern 
and central China was, however, a useful in- 
troduction to the new minister's career there, 
since it enabled him to obtain some personal 
acquaintance with the country and prosecute 
inquiries into the critical situation at Ningpo 
and Shanghai, two of the treaty ports threatened 
by the rebel armies. They actually captured 
the former city in November, but their general 
readily consented, upon representations from 
the three foreign consuls there, to spare the 

in the Blue Books of this decade. Mr. A. Michie's discursive life of 
Sir Rutherford Alcock, entitled "The Englishman in China during the 
Victorian Era," two vols., Edinburgh, 1900, is perhaps the most authori- 
tative treatment of the subject yet published. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 21 

property of aliens and desired them to continue 
their trade. The Tai-ping leaders proved them- 
selves to be better aware of the value of com- 
mercial intercourse with other countries than 
the imperial authorities, but their utter lack of 
discipline soon showed that any reliance upon 
their promises of protection was futile. The 
foreign community in Ningpo was only preserved 
during this winter by the presence of French 
and English war-vessels, and in Shanghai the 
menace of a rebel attack had to be met by a 
day's battle undertaken by all the soldiers and 
volunteers the foreigners could muster. It must 
be recalled in this connection that the Tai-pings 
professed to be Christians, and had introduced 
a travesty of Christian doctrines to their coun- 
trymen as the religion of the new dynasty. 
Europeans had watched their course with anx- 
iety for several years in the hope that these 
professions might mean a desire to establish a 
new rule in China in harmony with the spirit 
and culture of the West. Had the masters of 
this extraordinary movement been of sufficient 
calibre to understand the full advantage of 
foreign counsel and co-operation, they might 
conceivably, by this factor alone, have swept 
the Manchus from China despite the very real 
opposition to them always shown by the entire 



22 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

educated class in China. But in their igno- 
rance they destroyed trade and population alike, 
and in their conduct they belied every recog- 
nised doctrine of the faith which their preten- 
sions parodied. It required no unusual pene- 
tration for Mr. Burlingame to decide from his 
own observation during the winter that the Im- 
perial Government should be treated not only 
as the de jure power in the land, but sustained 
for the sake of humanity in its desperate struggle 
with anarchy by whatever moral support was 
allowable in a diplomatic agent.^ 

Upon his arrival in Peking, July 20, 1862, Mr. 
Burlingame was resolved not merely to main- 
tain a correct attitude toward the government 
of the infant Emperor, but to win its confidence, 
if possible, by an exhibition of candour and 
cordiality. This done he might hope for some 
return in kind, though he could not actually 

1 That Mr. Burlingame had to make up his own mind upon this matter 
is fairly evident from the instructions he received from the secretary of 
state in re the Ningpo situation. "You ought not to be trammelled 
with arbitrary instructions, especially in view of the peculiar character 
and habits of the Chinese people and government. In a different case 
the President would certainly instruct you to refrain most carefully 
from adopting any means which might disturb the confidence of the 
Imperial Government or give it any cause of solicitude, even though it 
might seem to be required for the safety of the property and interests 
of American citizens. But how can we know here what ability the 
Imperial Government may have, or even what disposition, to extend 
protection to foreigners which it had stipulated? Nevertheless, I think 
that it is your duty to act in the spirit which governs us in our intercourse 
with all friendly nations, and especially to lend no aid, encouragement. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 23 

expect it to abandon its ancient prejudices and 
consider the practicability of availing itself of 
the political wisdom of the West. For this end 
he also employed all the resources of his genial 
disposition and courageous optimism to secure 
the co-operation of his colleagues in the British, 
French, and Russian legations. It was a gallant 
programme, but the odds were decidedly against 
him. The United States — no longer united in 
fact — were for the moment discredited before the 
European world by the disasters of the first year 
of a civil war; their demands in Asia could not 
be supported by a single gunboat. The desire 
of foreign merchants and adventurers in the 
ports of China was to push the policy of grab as 
far as it could be conveniently carried against 
the Chinese authorities while they were hum- 
bled by the defeat of their army before Peking 
and harried by the depredations of the rebels. 
The doom of the reigning dynasty seemed to be 

or countenance to sedition or rebellion against the imperial authority. 
This direction, however, must not be followed so far as to put in jeopardy 
the Uves or property of American citizens in China. Great Britain and 
France are not only represented in China by diplomatic agents, but their 
agents are supported by land and naval forces, while, unfortunately, 
you are not. The interests of this country in China, so far as I under- 
stand them, are identical with those of the two other nations I have 
mentioned. There is no reason to doubt that the British and French 
ministers are acting in such a maimer as will best promote the interests 
of all the Western nations. You are, therefore, instructed to consult 
and co-operate with them, unless in special cases there shall be very 
satisfactory reasons for separating from them." (Seward to Burlingame, 
March 6, 1862, "Diplomatic Correspondence," 1862, p. 839.) 



24 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

at hand, and in the impending anarchy the for- 
eign element, demurely confident of its invin- 
cibility against Asiatics, saw no advantage in 
abiding by the treaties, but imagined, rather, 
another India prostrate before the first Euro- 
pean captain who was resolute enough to con- 
quer the capital and then the empire. The 
ignorant court, discredited by a long succes- 
sion of defeats, and fearful of the consequences 
of every act, wavered and temporised, but 
showed little inclination to address itself to 
those reforms in its institutions through which 
alone it might expect to escape from the immi- 
nent peril. 

Sincere friends of China, who from that day 
to this have deplored the apparently shiftless 
indirection of her policy, have not sufficiently 
realised that reforms of this sort could not be 
expected at once, or even from one generation 
of men; they involve not only a machinery of 
government but an intellectual point of view 
based upon the time-honoured models of Con- 
fucius. The system of control organised before 
the time of Christ had become so intimately a 
part of the life of China that none of its closely 
articulated parts could be materially altered 
without changing its whole economy. It is a 
fundamental of government as understood in the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 25 

West that official prerogative should be defined 
and the nature of its duties expressed. This 
entire conception was as repugnant to the typical 
Oriental mind of a generation ago as would be 
the definition of parental authority by a written 
contract. If the "modern" idea was to be ap- 
plied to a highly wrought paternalism like that 
of China, it meant, to begin with, the incon- 
ceivable indignity of limiting the Emperor him- 
self, the Solitary Man, who was the fountain not 
only of honour but of every function in the 
state, and relating every underling in the offi- 
cial hierarchy not to his natural chief but to a 
philosophic creation called law. The principle 
once admitted contradicts the accepted theory 
of a patriarchal government. We are watching, 
at last, the reconstruction of a polity that has 
withstood every havoc from Asiatics for twenty 
centuries, but which promises to succumb to the 
more virulent disintegrating influences gener- 
ated in Europe. The change is far more radical 
than most of us appreciate or than any of the 
earlier Western observers of Chinese affairs an- 
ticipated. Because the gigantic nature of this 
task has never been comprehended. Western 
literature upon Chinese politics has become, 
in great part, an issue of polemics against a 
people saturated with the spirit of a primi- 



26 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

live age and honourably, if stubbornly, devoted 
to other ideals than those of our own civilisa- 
tion. 

Yet the situation did not appear to be hope- 
less to a man inclined to estimate the Chinese 
character without prejudice and to credit peo- 
ple of every race and colour with the possession 
of feeling and common-sense. Indeed, the anti- 
slavery advocate could not hold consistently 
any less liberal views. Happily, it was now 
upon the imperial officials about the throne that 
the direct responsibility of meeting a difficult 
situation was imposed; they could no longer re- 
sort to the favourite device employed upon for- 
eigners for two centuries by provincial mandarins 
and shelve all questions for indefinite periods by 
reference to a higher authority. The location 
of the foreign legations in Peking had actually 
brought to the Manchu rulers their first lesson 
in the meaning of the term "diplomatic inter- 
course." As to the reputation of America in 
China, though she did not impress the Chinese 
imagination as a mighty power, she enjoyed a 
fairly clean record for probity and civility dur- 
ing the score of years since international treaty 
relations had begun; and good manners in the 
Orient constitute an asset of emphatic political 
importance. Had we as a nation sufficiently 



TPIE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 27 

considered the worth of this quahty during the 
past half-century, we might have less cause to- 
day for anxiety in contemplating the problems 
of the Far East.^ 

Mr. Burlingame's personal charm spelled good 
manners in any language spoken by civilised 
men. He, whose political experience at home 
was lightly flaunted by critics as his only recom- 
mendation for an appointment abroad, proved 
as soon as he entered upon his duties in China 
that it was precisely such training in the knowl- 
edge of human nature which, coupled with native 
ability and elevation of character, fitted him 
beyond his foreign coadjutors for success in 
dealing with unusual propositions in diplomacy. 
Being without prejudice, his generosity proved 
often to be a better guide than the circumspec- 
tion of some of those about him who were tech- 
nically trained in the profession. In Sir Fred- 
erick Bruce, the British minister, however, who 
had succeeded to the mission of his brother, 
Lord Elgin, in China, he found a man of his own 
cheerful temperament and breadth of view. 
Bruce had already reached the conclusion re- 
specting the Tai-pings at which Burlingame had 

1 "The root trouble with our relations with China, and more recently 
with Japan, is the contemptuous disregard of their point of view and the 
childish insistence upon our own." (A. H. Smith, "China and America 
To-day," New York, 1907, p. 178.) 



28 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

arrived before reaching Peking.^ He approved 
of the plan of strengthening the hand of the 
government by encouraging the organisation of 
a volunteer military troop under foreign officers, 
begun by Ward's " Ever- Victorious Force," near 
Shanghai, considering any risk to be feared from 
the introduction of an improved military system 
into China "less serious than the danger, com- 
mercial and political, we incur from the un- 
checked growth of anarchy," and being also 
convinced "that we, who neither seek territory 
nor promote by arms religious conversion, have 
little to apprehend from any success that may 
attend our efforts to raise the Chinese execu- 
tive out of its present helpless condition. . . . 
Nor do I consider," he adds, "that it will be a 
matter of regret or hostile to our interests that 
China should be encouraged, by a consciousness 
of her strength, to use bolder language in de- 
fence of her just rights. The weakness of China, 
rather than her strength, is likely to create a 
fresh Eastern question in these seas. In pro- 
portion, also, as the Chinese are obliged to resort 
to us for instruction, the policy of isolation and 
contempt for the outer world, from which our 

1 ". . . that the rebels must be disabused of the notion unfortunately 
instilled into them by missionaries and others that the sympathy of 
Western nations was enlisted in favour of this system of blasphemy, 
massacre, and pillage." (Bruce to Lord Russell, March 26, 1862.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 29 

difficulties have mainly arisen, must be aban- 
doned." ^ Furthermore, the British minister 
was disposed to check as far as possible the 
aggressive attitude of his countrymen engaged 
in trade in China, being impressed by the diplo- 
matic difficulties involved in their assumptions. 
A serious obstacle to restraining clandestine 
trading and illegal establishments set up by 
lawless foreigners was the reluctance of the 
Chinese Government to assert its own rights 
under the treaties. 

The greater the progress [writes Bruce], the more 
essential it is that the Chinese Government should 
be roused from this apathy and compelled to act in 
defence of its rights. For it is quite impossible that 
this duty can be accomplished for them. On the 
other hand, it is a false position and very incon- 
venient that the foreign minister should be con- 
stantly urging the Chinese Government to act against 
his own people, or against other foreigners, in its 
own defence. This branch of their international 
education must be undertaken by competent per- 
sons in their own service if it is to be effectually 
done. ... In a country like China commercial 
enterprise, if abandoned to its unchecked impulses, 

^ Ibid., "Parliamentary Papers," "Further Papers Relating to the 
. Rebellion in China," 1862, p. 9. The dispatch is written four months 
before Bruce and Burlingame met. His ideas were diametrically op- 
posed to the opportunist programme of the merchants, who objected to 
his broad altruism for much the same reason that the moon disapproves 
of the sun's appearing at midnight in the classic of "The Walrus and the 
Carpenter." 



30 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

will either lead to a suicidal catastrophe or become 
the herald of war.^ 

A few months' residence in Peking showed the 
new American minister that in this remote cap- 
ital, inaccessible to steam and telegraphic com- 
munication, it was easy, in the absence of daily 
interpellation from interested parties, to cement 
friendships among the small coterie of foreigners 
thus inevitably thrown into intimate social re- 
lations. The diplomatic and missionary circles, 
constituting the only classes of foreigners resi- 
dent in Peking, numbering less than fifty souls 
in all, were alike inspired by a real desire to 
benefit the Chinese by their presence and influ- 
ence. In the wholesome detachment of such 
agreeable surroundings a man of Mr. Burlin- 
game's temperament and ideals would naturally 
prefer a magnanimous attitude toward the Im- 
perial Government as offering in the end the best 
chance for furthering the objects of his mission. 
Statesmen like Prince Kung and Wen-siang, as 
leaders of the only pro-foreign party in the em- 

1 Bruce to Earl Russell, October 13, 1862. ("Further Papers," pre- 
sented 1863, p. 132.) In another dispatch he writes: "As far as I can 
judge from Mr. Burlingame's language, he entirely concurs in the two 
main principles which I think should guide us in our deliberations, 
namely, that our true interest consists in the suppression of rebellion 
and in the restoration of order, and that the opening of ports and the 
formation of settlements, without the presence of consular authority, 
will lead to quarrels and misunderstandings with the people and be ulti- 
mately disadvantageous to our position in China." {Ibid., p. 80.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 31 

pire, whatever their secret sentiments toward 
the white races, were at least committed by this 
time to a course of honourable dealing with 
them. This fact had rather isolated these few 
men. They needed assistance against the reac- 
tionary party in the country, which was known 
or suspected to be awaiting a favourable oppor- 
tunity to overthrow the reigning dynasty. To 
support them by reducing to a minimum causes 
of misunderstanding and complaint was obvi- 
ously better for the foreigners than anything 
now to be secured from making common cause 
with the discredited Tai-pings, or to be expected 
from constraining those conservatives who pre- 
served an attitude of unvarying hostility toward 
Western peoples. It cannot be alleged that the 
Prince and his followers were sincere, but unless 
the Christian world was prepared to undertake 
the conquest of China it is difficult to see how 
its representatives could advance their legiti- 
mate aims at this juncture better than by ac- 
cepting their assurances and insisting in turn 
upon a policy of candour and truth for the 
future.^ 

On his way to Peking, Mr. Burlingame had 
written (June 2, 1862) to the secretary of state 

1 Some account of Peking fifty years ago may be found in Dr. Rennie's 
"Pekin and the Pekinese," two vols., London, 1863, and in Michie's 
"The Englishman in China," vol. II. 



32 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

that *'if the treaty powers could agree among 
themselves to the neutrality of China, and to- 
gether secure order in the treaty ports, and give 
their moral support to that party in China in 
favour of order, the interests of humanity would 
be subserved." ^ After reaching the capital he 
found the other ministers to be in accord with 
him in this general principle. He obtained their 
support in negotiations for regulating trade on 
the Yangtse, in relation to the employment of 
foreign officers in operations against the Tai- 
pings, and in the difficult matter of concessions 
and independent authority demanded by for- 
eign merchants in the treaty ports. The British 
and French envoys readily appreciated "the 
advantage that would flow from the casting 
down of all jealousies and by a co-operation on 
every material question in China." In view of 
collateral changes in policy before the end of 
the century, it is interesting to note that Mr. 
Burlingame "found Mr. Balluzeck, the Russian 
minister, prompt to answer, in the spirit of the 
Russian treaty, that his government did not de- 
sire ^to menace at any time the territorial integ- 
rity of China, but on the contrary wished to 
bring it more and more into the family of nations, 

^Quoted in his own dispatch to Seward, June 20, 1863. ("Diplo- 
matic Correspondence," 1864, part I, p. 859.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION S3 

subject in its relations with foreign powers to 
the obhgations of international law; that he 
was but too happy to co-operate in a policy that 
would ingraft Western upon Eastern civilisation 
without a disruption of the Chinese Empire." ^ 
The text of the proposition constituting Mr. 
Burlingame's principle of action in China is 
embodied in a portion of this same dispatch: 

The policy upon which we agreed is briefly this: 
that while we claim our treaty right to buy and sell 
and hire in the treaty ports, subject, in respect to 
our rights of property and person, to the jurisdiction 
of our own governments, we will not ask for, nor 
take concessions of, territory in the treaty ports, or 
in any way interfere with the jurisdiction of the 
Chinese Government over its own people, nor ever 
menace the territorial integrity of the Chinese Em- 
pire. That we will not take part in the internal 
struggles in China beyond what is necessary to main- 
tain our treaty rights. That the latter we will 
unitedly sustain against all who may violate them. 
To this end we are now clear in the policy of defend- 
ing the treaty ports against the Tai-pings, or rebels; 
but in such a way as not to make war upon that 
considerable body of the Chinese people by follow- 
ing them into the interior of their country. In this 
connection, while we feel desirous, from what we 
know of it, to have the rebellion put down, still we 
have become (sic) to question the policy of lending 
government officers to lead the Chinese in the field, 
for fear of complications among ourselves, grow- 

^ Burlingame to Seward, June 20, 1863. 



34 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

ing out of the relative number to be employed, etc. 
That while we wish to give our moral support to the 
government, at the present time the power in the 
country which seems disposed to maintain order and 
our treaty rights, we should prefer that it organise 
its own defence, taking only foreigners for instruc- 
tion in the arts of peace and war, and these, as far 
as possible, from the smaller treaty powers. . . . 

I need not attempt to prove the advantages which 
must flow from co-operation; that we should do so, 
all must admit. By the favoured-nation clause in 
the treaties, no nation can gain, by any sharp act 
of diplomacy, any privilege not secured to all. The 
circumstances conspire to make this a fortunate 
moment in which to inaugurate the co-operative 
policy. The treaty powers are represented here by 
men of modern ideas, by men who, in this land 
where everything is to be done, do not choose to 
embarrass each other by sowing distrust in the 
Chinese mind, but who, with an open policy and 
common action, deepen each other's confidence and 
win the respect of the Chinese. That the too 
sanguine hopes in relation to China of our more 
advanced civilisation may be fully realised by any 
action we may take, ought not to be expected. . . . 

The trouble here now is that we are dealing with 
a regency which, in a few years, must hand over its 
doings to the Emperor and those he may call around 
him. The regency dare not depart in the smallest 
particular from the old traditions, and yet these 
will not do for these times. They are distrustful of 
us, and are afraid of their censors and distant local 
authorities. Besides, there is a large anti-foreign 
party here. There are members of the Foreign 
Board who, if left to themselves, would at once 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 35 

place China in perfect international relations with 
us; but sitting with them are spies, who paralyse 
them in their action with us, to fall, as they fre- 
quently do, far short of their promises. In their 
weakness they resort to tergiversations to such an 
extent as to menace, and to cause us in our passion- 
ate moods, almost to despair of holding, with dig- 
nity, any relations at all with them. Our only hope 
is in forbearance and perfect union among ourselves; 
if these are maintained, and our government sus- 
tains us in the policy we have adopted, I, cannot but 
be hopeful of the future, and feel that a great step 
has been taken in the right direction in China. 

A review of the correspondence between Mr. 
Burlingame and the secretary of state, during 
the five years which followed this dispatch, 
reveals both his loyalty to the principle here 
propounded and his chivalrous faith in the 
regeneration of China brought to pass by the 
exercise of patience and fair play. Whatever 
the obstacles contrived by the duplicity of 
officials, the criticisms directed upon him and 
his coadjutors by designing and disreputable 
Europeans at the ports, or the temptations 
brought up by hope long delayed to revert to 
the old practice of bullying China, the minister 
maintained his attitude consistently. Secure in 
his confidence of moral support from his three 
confreres in the other legations, he was content 
to let the disappointed -traders cavil and to 



36 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

await the work of time. As the representative, 
during this period, of the only foreign power 
which had never fought China, the only one, 
moreover, which at this time was unable to 
bring a single soldier across the ocean to enforce 
its demands, his control of the situation based 
upon a firm moral conviction was extraordinary. 
Under his monition the "Four B's," as they were 
called, — Balluzeck, Berthemy, Bruce, and Bur- 
lingame, — constituted a self-appointed com- 
mittee of safety for China, and insured her 
passage into a peaceful period of internal re- 
construction which endured for twenty years. 
The conservatism of an empire which had never 
in its long history consciously received any 
contribution from Western culture proved ob- 
durate, indeed, and disappointed the expecta- 
tions of its well-wishers; but the proper measure 
of the Burlingame plan is to be sought rather 
in a consideration of the alternatives involved. 
Had the exasperations comprehended in a policy 
of pin-pricks and exaggerated claims for in- 
demnity been allowed to drive the Chinese once 
more to armed resistance, another European 
invasion of China would inevitably have brought 
other powers — notably Prussia — to claim a 
share in the spoils of conquest; and in the parti- 
tion of the empire amongst them it is hard to 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 37 

see how an ultimate conflict between the de- 
spoilers could have been avoided. And in such 
an issue what of the share of the United States? 
It has always professed a peculiar aversion to 
harpy nations; but in the exhaustion of a civil 
war it could not have either restrained or joined 
the harpies if it would. \ The partition of China 
meant then, as it would mean to-day, the end 
of equal opportunity for foreign commercial 
states, and America would have been compelled 
to retire empty-handed. With no ulterior pur- 
pose beyond that of a common benefit, Mr. 
Burlingame's manhood and urbanity gained 
more, in the most selfish estimate, for his coun- 
try than could have derived from any other 
policy.^ 

A few topics may be taken from his published 
correspondence during his residence in China 
as illustrations of Mr. Burlingame's diplomatic 
activities. In the spring of 1863, he protests 
against the attempt of a French consul at Ningpo 
to acquire the concession of a part of the city 
for the French Government. This was a method 
of filching property and control from Oriental 

1 "The foreign ministers," says Mr. H. N. Lay, at that time inspector- 
general of the Chinese customs service, "met frequently at the house of 
Mr. Burlingame as upon neutral territory, and there we discussed over 
our cigars Chinese policy past and present, and in our stroll, which usually 
closed the afternoon's confab, the policy that should be pursued in the 
future was the constant theme." ("Our Interests in China," p. 40.) 



38 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

governments then in vogue. It was a favourite 
claim among foreigners in China that in such 
concessions the Europeans could exercise juris- 
diction not only over their nationals, but over 
the Chinese, an assumption which naturally 
would inspire competition between the stronger 
and more ambitious powers as to which of them 
could secure the most without seeming to im- 
pinge overtly upon the rights of others. The 
possibilities of friction from this source were 
serious. Upon Mr. BurHngame's representations 
to the Tsung-li Yamen and to his colleagues the 
disruptive character of such proceedings was 
recognised, the Chinese officials encouraged to 
resist such aggressions, and the newly arrived 
French minister persuaded to repress the efforts 
of his consul.^ To establish the principle, he 
obtained from Mr. Bruce in the following year 
the publication of a circular to the British con- 
suls defining the limits of British jurisdiction 
over leased territory in China, a declaration of 
the first importance in creating a precedent for 
/Rulings under extraterritorial control.^ The set- 
tlement of Shanghai, at present the most im- 
portant European community in Asia, received 
during his term of service its charter of mu- 

1 "United States Diplomatic Correspondence," 1864, part I, p. 851. 

2 Ihid., 1865, part III, p. 380. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 39 

nicipal government, based upon the principles 
propounded by the foreign ministers as follows: 
That whatever territorial authority is estab- 
lished shall be derived directly from the Imperial 
Government; that it shall not extend beyond 
simple municipal matters; that Chinese not ^ 
actually in foreign employ shall be wholly under 
the control of their own officials; that each 
consul shall have the government over his own 
nationals, the municipal police simply arresting 
offenders and handing them over to the proper 
authorities; that a reference shall be made to 
the Chinese element in the municipal system in 
measures affecting them.^ 

It was recognised in this outline that the 
jurisdiction covering cases between natives and 
foreigners under extraterritoriality was imper- 
fect. In such an untried branch of jurispru- 
dence, however, the ablest lawyers of Christendom 
were disposed to await the results of experience. 
In 1879, under Mr. G. F. Seward as United 
States minister, the subject of mixed courts was 
thoroughly discussed, and a general policy 
adopted in accord with that initiated by his 
predecessor, which has continued to the present. 
Chinese law courts provided no adequate rem- 

^ Ihidb., 1864, part I, p. 857. The first international agreement cover- 
ing the control of this municipality seems to have been that of July 5, 
1854. 



y 



40 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

edies in settlement of claims against Chinese 
debtors, nor would they allow the presence of 
foreigners as parties, witnesses, or attorneys; a 
consul, therefore, had usually to instruct the 
Chinese magistrate as to the proper judgment, 
despite the treaty provision that the decision 
be made by the judge of the defendant's nation- 
ality. From this practice arose the system of 
mixed courts at present in operation, based upon 
the international tribunals in Egypt as examples, 
but deemed at that time impracticable for China. ^ 
Mr. Burlingame's concern in the incident 
known as that of the "Lay-Osborn Flotilla," 
was only that of a mediator, but his tact and 
the close personal friendship he had cemented 
with the British minister enabled him to bring 
the Chinese to an amicable agreement in an 
embarrassing matter, where under less amiable 
guidance a rupture might have ensued. An 
Englishman, Horatio Nelson Lay, the first 
inspector-general of the imperial customs ser- 
vice, was allowed to order a number of gunboats 
to be constructed in England for a Chinese 
coast patrol against pirates and smugglers. He 
greatly exceeded his instructions in executing the 

1 F. E. Hinckley, "American Consular Jurisdiction in the Orient," 
1906, p. 159. Mr. Hinckley was the first, so far as I know, to call the 
co-operative policy one and the same thing as the "more recently called 
open-door policy." 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 41 

order, and in 1863 the Chinese found themselves 
confronted by a fleet of eight powerful steamers, 
in charge of English officers and crews, who 
were engaged to man them for a term of four 
years, to serve only under their English com- 
manders and receive pay through Mr. Lay's 
hands. The Chinese naturally declined to ratify 
an arrangement which actually involved an ab- 
dication of sovereignty in their own country. 
But in refusing to accept them, the vessels re- 
mained a menace to the peace of the Far East, 
either from pirates who might obtain them for 
use off the China coast, or for those feudal 
nobles in Japan who were upon the verge of 
rebellion, or for agents of the American Con- 
federacy in Asia who were on the lookout for 
just such swift cruisers as these to prey upon 
American shipping. Mr. Burlingame, conscious 
of the gravity of the crisis, and quickened by 
the risk to his own country, advised the Chinese, 
"1st, to give their reasons fully for not ratifying 
the offensive articles of the agreement; 2d, to 
thank the British Government and Captain Os- 
born for what they had done for them; and 3d, 
that inasmuch as there was a misunderstanding 
between them and their agent which could not 
be reconciled, they should request the British 
minister to have the flotilla returned to England 



42 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

under the direction of Captain Osborn, the 
ships sold, the men paid off and discharged, 
and the proceeds remitted to them. They fol- 
lowed this advice to the letter." 

Perhaps no single event in his life in China 
illustrates better than this the kind of hazards 
confronting a foreign minister dealing with Asi- 
atics uninured to the affairs of a new world, or 
the risks devolving which may bring a group of 
nations into jeopardy. *'Had Captain Osborn," 
observes Mr. Burlingame, "thought more of his 
pecuniary interests and less of his own and his 
country's honour, he would have taken com- 
mand on the Chinese conditions — have made 
an attack upon Nanking, won a temporary noto- 
riety, and left his country involved in a mortal 
struggle with the rebels and subject to the 
taunts of the civilised world." ^ The quotation 

1 Burlingame to Seward, November 7, 1863. The two chief documents 
on this incident are "Parliamentary Papers, China, no. 2 (1864)," "The 
Lay-Osborn Flotilla Papers," and H. N. Lay's "Our Interests in China. 
A Letter to Earl Russell," London, 1885, 71 pages. Lay was, of course, 
dismissed from Chinese employ. The effect of this contretemps upon 
the progressive party in Peking was disastrous. Sir Rutherford Alcock 
alludes to it thus in a letter to Lord Stanley, January 1, 1868: "Our own 
dealings with the Osborn Flotilla left deep traces of discouragement in 
the official mind, and paralysed by far the most advanced and progressive 
among the leading ministers of the Yamen and Grand Secretariat. It 
went far also to destroy his influence, especially in regard to progress or 
reforms by foreign agencies. . . . The whole burden of the fiasco fell 
upon the Yamen and the progressive party in the state, and notably 
upon Wen-siang, with whom the scheme had originated. However 
unavoidable at last, the results were deplorable." ("Parliamentary 
Papers, China, no. 5 (1871)," p. 114.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 43 

is significant as illustrating Mr. Burlingame's 
characteristic magnanimity in awarding praise 
to others whom his own services as mediator 
had brought into agreement. An indirect re- 
sult of this episode was the establishment of 
Robert Hart in the place of the discredited Lay 
— an appointment which was to develop in the 
next forty years the most remarkable and cred- 
itable career of any European, perhaps, in Asia 
during the century. 

Before his departure from Shanghai the 
American minister made the acquaintance of 
General Frederick T. Ward, "an American sol- 
dier of fortune, but one who reflected extraor- 
dinary credit upon American valour and mili- 
tary skill." ^ The career of this remarkable but 
little-known Yankee in the Far East, to whom 
was due the creation of the famous "Ever- 
Victorious Army," renders Mr. Burlingame's 
accounts of him in two letters to Mr. Seward 
of some value historically. In intrusting his 
younger brother, H. G. Ward, with letters of 
introduction to the President and the secretary 
of state, he writes (March 7, 1862): "Colonel 
Ward, now, I believe, a general in the Chinese 
service, is an American to whom my attention 
was first called by Admiral Sir James Hope, 

* General J. W. Foster, "Diplomatic Memoirs," vol. II, p. 294. 



44 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

who wanted to introduce him to me, and who 
commended him warmly for his courage and 
skill. He is instructing the Chinese in the use 
of European weapons, and has about two thou- 
sand of them trained, whom he has led in a most 
desperate manner, successfully, in several recent 
battles. I know nothing of him since what 
I have learned from Sir J. Hope, the Chinese, 
and himself. He says he was born in Salem, 
Massachusetts, went to sea when a boy, became 
mate of a ship, and then was a Texas ranger, 
Calif ornian gold-miner, instructor in the Mexican 
service, was with Walker — for which he was 
outlawed by his government — at the Crimea, 
and then joined the Chinese, among whom he 
has gradually risen to influence and power. He 
is now their best officer, and for his recent suc- 
cesses has been recommended by the Chinese 
and English for still greater promotion. He 
says he is a loyal American, and, though a 
Chinese by adoption, he desires above all things 
that his country shall have its full weight in the 
affairs of China. I have felt it to be my duty 
to write all these things that you may have all 
the light I have." 

The second letter, written after Ward had 
been killed in battle, shows his patriotism. 
October 26, 1862. . . . "General Ward was a 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 45 

man of great wealth, and in a letter to me, 
the last, probably, he ever wrote, he proposed 
through me to contribute ten thousand taels to 
the Government of the United States to aid in 
maintaining the Union; but before I could re- 
spond to this patriotic letter he died. Let this 
wish, though unexecuted, find worthy record in 
the archives of his native land, to show that 
neither self-exile, nor foreign service, nor the 
incidents of a stormy life could extinguish from 
the breast of this wandering child of the republic 
the fires of a truly loyal heart. After Ward's 
death, fearing that his force might dissolve and 
be lost to the cause of order, I hastened by ex- 
press to inform the Chinese Government of my 
desire that an American might be selected to 
fill his place, and was so fortunate, against con- 
siderable opposition, as to secure the appoint- 
ment of Colonel Burgevine, Ward's second in 
command, and an American. He had taken 
part in all the conflicts with Ward, and common 
fame spoke well of him. Mr. Bruce, the British 
minister, as far as I know, did not antagonise 
me, and the gallant Sir James Hope favoured 
the selection of Burgevine. Others did not. I 
felt that it was no more than fair that an Ameri- 
can should command the foreign-trained Chinese 
on land, as the English through Osborn would 



46 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

command the same quality of force on sea. Do 
not understand by the above that I have pushed 
the American interests to the extent of angry 
disagreement. On the contrary, by the avowal 
of an open and a friendly policy, and proceed- 
ing on the declaration that the interests of the 
Western nations are identical, I have been met 
by the representatives of the other treaty powers 
in a corresponding spirit, and we are now work- 
ing together in a sincere effort to strengthen the 
cause of civilisation in the East." ^ 

The incident involved Mr. Burlingame's par- 
ticular attention at this time, and resulted, 
rather curiously, in the employment by the 
Chinese Government of another famous English- 
man, General Charles George Gordon. Upon 
the death of General Ward, and after Mr. Bur- 
lingame's proposal. Captain Burgevine, an ex- 
Confederate officer, took charge of the Ever- 
Victorious Force, but presently, falling foul of 
one of Li Hung-chang's agents in Shanghai, was 
denounced as a robber of public money. He 
appealed to the minister at Peking, who dis- 
covered on presenting his case to the Tsung-li 
Yamen that a varied assortment of charges had 
been there arrayed against the American by his 

^ Burlingame to Seward, nos. 11 and 27. United States State Depart-- 
ment Archives, "China," vol. 20. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 47 

personal enemies ; also that the government arro- 
gated its right to execute him after due process 
of Chinese law. The claim had to be denied as 
being directly contrary to treaty stipulations, and 
in this point the foreign envoys supported the 
American minister unanimously. The charges 
themselves were found upon investigation to 
be spurious, and the Yamen showed its will- 
ingness to quash them, but two of the most 
prominent provincial officials in the empire, 
Tseng Kwo-fan and Li Hung-chang, were impli- 
cated in this plot to suppress an undesirable 
foreigner, and "the sum to do was to restore 
Burgevine without offending these local author- 
ities." After protracted correspondence, which 
must have by its firmness surprised the Chinese 
statesmen who had counted upon Mr. Burlin- 
game's good-nature, the accusations were with- 
drawn as based upon false evidence, and Burge- 
vine was cleared. Unhappily he considered his 
grievances sufficient justification, a short time 
thereafter, to go over with a part of his regiment 
to the rebels at Soochow. Deserting these in 
turn, after Gordon's appointment to his old 
place, he actually, through the latter's good 
offices, secured pardon from Li and was rein- 
stated in the Ever- Victorious Force. Then, ap- 
"parently in sheer bravado, he openly declared his 



48 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

hostility to the imperial cause and his intention to 
rejoin the Tai-pings when he could. For this the 
American consul at Shanghai promptly confined 
him, in order to prevent further complications, 
and compelled him to choose between an imme- 
diate departure from China or a trial in the 
consular court. He chose deportation, which 
the Chinese allowed with some pardonable re- 
luctance. It was a galling case, in relation of 
which the Chinese were undoubtedly very deeply 
stirred. They were aware that no state in 
Christendom was so impotent as to be unable 
to punish a proved rebel and traitor when fairly 
apprehended; but Prince Kung writes (May 1, 
1864) to Mr. Burlingame that "in consideration 
of our present amicable relations, and desirous 
to show more than ordinary regard, I will waive 
all further investigation in this matter if your 
excellency will deport him to his own country." ^ 
In another matter, of considerable importance 
to this country, the American minister secured 
from the Chinese Government an order to the 

^"Diplomatic Correspondence," part I, 1864, pp. 864-875, and part 
III, 1865, pp. 421-5. Burgevine's end has really nothing to do with the 
subject in hand. He met his death rather mysteriously after returning to 
China about a year later (June, 1865), while a prisoner of Li Himg- 
chang's troops, when the viceroy had no intention of letting his prey slip 
a second time through the meshes of diplomacy. His fate was palpably 
the result of his own imprudence; he was but one pf an assortment of 
adventurers who infested the Far East inspired by hopes like his of 
making their fortunes in the disorders which assailed China during 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 49 

governors of the maritime provinces forbidding 
the Alabama, "and every other vessel with sim- 
ilar designs, from entering our ports," or to ap- 
proach the coast of China. "Such an order," 
declares General Foster, "enforced by the gov- 
ernments of Europe, would have saved the 
American commercial marine from destruction 
and shortened the Civil War. It was a striking 
evidence of the influence of the minister and of 
the friendship of the Chinese Government." ^ 
The dispatch, hitherto unpublished, advises the 
department of his action as follows : 

(Confidential.) In my regular dispatch I have 
informed you of the action of the Chinese Govern- 
ment adverse to the rebel cruisers. I was led to act 
from the near approach of the steamer Alabama. 
My first step was to secure for my plan the good-will 
of my colleagues. Accordingly I carefully presented 
the whole question to them and, happily, with much 
success. Mr. Vlangaly, the Russian minister, pro- 
posed, if necessary, to aid me in urging my views 
upon the Chinese. Sir Frederick Bruce, the British 
minister, permitted his able interpreter, J. McLeavy 
Brown, Esq., to act with Dr. Williams in the later 

these parlous years. Prince Kung's comment on conveying the intel- 
ligence of his decease to Mr. Williams is characteristic: "Burgevine 
himself was a man who, by his frequent connection with the rebels, had,J^ 
as you formerly remarked, acted so as to lose the countenance of his 
own country. It would have been right, therefore, to have regarded 
him as amenable to the laws of China; but as he has now met his death 
by the upsetting of the boat, there need be no further discussion about 
him." {Ibid., part I, 1867, pp. 462-478.) 

1 "American Diplomacy in the Orient," p. 159. 



50 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

discussions. Mr. Berthemy, the French minister, 
was equally friendly. 

The next step was to bring the question before 
the Chinese in such a way as to succeed. This was 
first done by conversation; then by an elaborate 
unofficial memorandum containing reasons for action 
which might be used among themselves. Finally, 
it was agreed that I should address to the Prince a 
formal request which might become the basis of a 
proclamation. This I did, as you will learn from 
the enclosed. . . . The proclamation secures to us 
such aid as the Chinese may have. They have near 
Shanghai a few small steamers besides Ward's old 
force, now under Gordon, well supplied with artil- 
lery. Guns may be so placed at the mouths of the 
harbours as to prevent the cruisers from getting in 
to take our splendid steamers on the Yangtse or, if 
they once obtain entrance, from getting out again. 
If they should go into Whampoa to dock, or to 
Canton, a gun or two placed at the old Bogue forts 
would make it dangerous for them. The Chinese 
custom-housei^officers are intelligent Europeans who, 
in conjunction with the Americans at the ports, may 
be able to do something. I shall set all the machi- 
nery at work that I can against the privateers.^ 

A few examples of Mr. Burlingame's apprecia- 
tion of Chinese interests and of his courtesy 
toward their public men may be adduced to 
explain the sincere regard for him which en- 
gendered their remarkable proposal at the end 
of his term of office. By temperament disposed 

1 Burlingame to Seward. United States State Department, "China," 
vol. 21, March 17, 1864. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 51 

to augur well from even the smallest signs of 
progress, he was called fatuous by unkindly 
European critics, but there was justification at 
the time for a policy of optimism when China 
seemed willing to respond to more generous 
diplomatic relations. Soon after arriving at 
his post he reports the adoption by China of 
a national flag in a sentence which, to old resi- 
dents weary of waiting for a real change of the 
Chinese heart, must have been little less than 
irritating. *' Surely," he exclaims, "the words im- 
movable Chinese civilisation have lost their sig- 
nificance. By this act the Imperial Government, 
casting down the last shred of its exclusiveness, 
confronts us with a symbol of its power and 
demands a place among the nations." ^ Of 
course they were themselves unaware of any 
such intention, yet it is true that in consenting 
to this innovation the Chinese implied their de- 
sire to be ranked with other nations in at least 
one practice common to the rest of mankind. 
The appointment to a seat in the Tsung-li 
Yamen of Siu Ki-yu, a former provincial gov- 
ernor, who had been degraded in 1842 because 
of a favourable notice of America in a published 
book, suggested to Mr. Burlingame the gift of 
a portrait of Washington by the United States 

^ Burlingame to Seward, October 27, 1862. 



52 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Government, as a fitting recognition of his tribute 
to that great statesman. When the picture was 
presented with due ceremony the impression 
produced may be fairly said to have affected the 
whole of educated China. 

A greater service to the enlightenment and wel- 
fare of that land, but one less appreciated by its 
inhabitants, was the minister's proposal, which 
found favour with the officials, to employ Pro- 
fessor Raphael Pumpelly — visiting Peking dur- 
ing the autumn of 1863, after completing a 
geological investigation in Japan — to make a 
report on the coal measures near the capital. 
The significance of the permission thus ob- 
tained can be understood only when we remem- 
ber that the conservatives were most jealous 
and fearful of allowing foreigners to secure pre- 
cisely such information as this upon the mineral 
resources of the empire. It was Mr. Burlin- 
game's plan to interest the high officials in ex- 
ploiting these resources for the profit of the state 
and involve them logically in the necessity of 
applying railways and engines, when they should 
see for themselves that their business demanded 
such things. This expectation was not justi- 
fied, indeed, because those officials had no loyal 
conception of advantages to the empire as dis- 
tinguished from their personal benefit; but the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 53 

eagerness of foreigners to exploit their mines at 
once alarmed the native mind, none too anxious 
at best to tamper with the mysteries of science 
and nature, and pushed them in their terror 
into increasing obstinacy of refusal. It may be 
contended that Mr. Burlingame was deceived, 
and that the mandarins were playing upon his 
abounding good-nature, but the fact remains 
true that, judged merely from the lower motive 
of a quid pro quo, his trust in their sincerity 
secured greater concessions from the govern- 
ment in five years than came to foreigners by 
peaceful means in the following forty. 

His insight was less apt to err than the learn- 
ing and experience of others on many occasions 
where the personal factor was predominant. 
The sentiment of personal dignity — "saving the 
face," as it is called in China — has a more 
serious meaning there than elsewhere. Realising 
this, he was ever ready to assuage the feelings 
of the men with whom he was called to deal, 
and, if need be, to avoid pressing an unpleasant 
point until unpleasant language became neces- 
sary. Had proper attention been given by other 
foreigners to the susceptibilities of people of old- 
fashioned culture, the paths of diplomacy might 
have been pleasanter and have led, perhaps, to 
more profitable results in the Far East during 



54 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the past half -century. Mr. BurHngame's benign 
consideration, though temperamental in its ori- 
gin, was an essential factor in his diplomacy, 
and it paid. As the American people have 
lately been reminded by Dr. Wu Ting-fang's 
intrepid sarcasm, "China is not like America, 
England, or any part of Europe. We have been 
thought to be a peculiar people. We are pecu- 
liar in some ways — in politeness, civility, and 
in manners." ^ 

As objections to Mr. Burlingame's work in 
China were chiefly based upon the charge that 
he was much too easy with a people deeply 
versed in the arts of chicanery, it is proper here 
to quote a characteristic letter in which his prin- 
ciples of action are briefly set forth : 

I have the honour to enclose a correspondence in 
relation to smuggling and arrests on the Yangtse. 
The strictures of the Prince upon Mr. Seward are 
alluded to in dignified language in my reply, and 
were subsequently made the subject of satisfactory 
explanations. . . . The trouble here is that the lo- 
cal authorities, desiring to make a show of activity, 
send up the most exaggerated statements in relation 
to everybody and everything. The consuls form a 
fruitful subject of their attack; but learning at 
length that their statements are not permitted to 
go unchallenged, the local Chinese officials are be- 

1 Speech at the annual dinner of the American Asiatic Association in 
New York, September 20, 1909. {Journal American Asiaiic Association, 
vol. 9, p. 266.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 55 

coming more cautious. The authorities here, exas- 
perated at the undeniable violations of the treaty 
by lawless parties, are too apt to confound respect- 
able merchants with smugglers and rebels and to 
use the same language in reference to all. Time and 
patience alone are required to correct these things. 
I do not reply in kind : if I did, the controversy would 
be endless and fruitless. My practice is to corre- 
spond as little as possible, and then to make my 
letters brief and plain. This course gradually wins 
their respect and leads them into more respectful 
style. Nothing confuses these men more than to 
let them know that you think they have been want- 
ing in politeness. I am trying with my colleagues 
to secure a mixed commission, which will at least 
collect evidence not to be denied by either party. 
Now both parties send up the most confusing and 
contradictory statements. From these I say one 
thing and the Chinese another; from this unprom- 
ising attitude we seek an equitable solution of ques- 
tions. In the interests of justice I sometimes go to 
the verge of diplomatic propriety in seeking to con- 
trovert what I may deem the false statements of 
their officials. 

The Chinese feel sensitive when I give more weight 
to our people's statements than to those of their 
people. In an enclosure you will find a significant 
illustration of this feeling, where they express the 
hope that as they believed my statements in the 
Scotland case, that I will believe theirs as unques- 
tionably in turn. I write the above to show the 
difficulties of the situation and to explain the corre- 
spondence which I sometimes send you. I believe 
my relations with them were never better than they 
are at present. Our frequent interviews have made 



56 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

us well acquainted and strengthened our faith in 
each other.^ 

Durinsf an absence on leave in America be- 

j 

tween the spring of 1865 and the autumn of 
1866, Mr. Burlingame was able to advise the 
department of state upon the condition of 
affairs and to discuss with the secretary some 
proposals for future activity in China. Mr. 
Seward was personally a cordial supporter of 
his policy there, but in the turmoil of recon- 
struction after the Civil War little interest in 
the East could be enlisted from Congress or 
the politicians of America, and nothing was 
accomplished. One suggestion embodied in a 
dispatch of the secretary, dated December 15, 
1865, may, however, be noted as a promoting 
cause of the first essay made by China to ex- 
amine into and report upon foreign nations 
through an agent of her own. 

Sir: The harmonious condition of the relations 
between the United States and China, and the im- 
portance of the commerce between them, would 
make it agreeable to this government to receive 

1 Burlingame to Seward, May 26, 1864. "Diplomatic Correspon- 
dence," 1865, part III, p. 382. "While such are our obligations with 
respect to the foreign representatives in China," he writes Consul G. F. 
Seward at another time, "they are equally strong toward the Chinese 
officials, whether native or foreign; for it is through these that we main- 
tain our relations with China, and any want of courtesy or consideration 
at once reacts upon ourselves and destroys our power for usefulness," 
ilbid., p. 430.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 57 

from the Emperor a diplomatic representative of a 
grade corresponding with your own. It is true that 
this would be a novel, if not an unprecedented step 
on the part of that government. As treaties, how- 
ever, have for many years been in force between 
China and Christian nations, and as the empire may 
now be disposed to respect the obligations of public 
law, it strikes us that the Emperor's Government 
would be consulting their own interest, and would 
be reciprocating that which, to a degree, at least, 
is a courtesy on our part, by having a diplomatic 
agent here, whose province it would be to see that 
our obligations toward China, under the treaties 
and law of nations, are fulfilled, and who might re- 
port to his government upon that and other inter- 
esting topics. China also may be said to have spe- 
cial reasons for the measure in respect to the United 
States, as her subjects are so numerous in this 
country, particularly in California. You will conse- 
quently bring this matter to the attention of that 
government, and may say that, if the suggestion 
should be adopted, it would be peculiarly gratifying 
to the President.^ 

■ This document was obviously intended to be 
shown to the Tsung-li Yamen, and was for- 
warded to Mr. Williams, the charge in Peking, 
who could be trusted to soften in translation its 
slightly patronising tone. It may have quick- 
ened the resolve of that body to accede to a 
proposal which had often before been made to 
them, though, as Mr. Williams reports: 

^ Seward to Burlingame, " United States Foreign Relations," 1866, 
part I, p. 487. 



58 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Tliey have acted in it now without any urging, 
and apparently from a conviction of the benefits 
which they may derive; so that, being quite volun- 
tary on their part, the step is regarded by the diplo- 
matic body here as an advance in the right direction. 
The delegate sent on this mission is Pin-Chun (ad- 
dressed as Pin-tajin), who has been acting for two 
or three years as revisor of custom-house returns, 
in connection with the foreign inspectorate, and has 
thus been brought into contact with foreigners and 
learned as much of their countries as his opportu- 
nities allowed. Before leaving the capital he was 
raised to the third rank, and formally introduced 
by Prince Kung to the foreign ministers on their 
New Year's visit as his agent to their respective 
countries, sent on the part of the Foreign Office. 
His instructions require him to make careful notes 
on the customs, peoples, and all objects of interest 
in the lands he visits. . . . 

This mission from China to the West will be of 
great benefit to this government, if Pin-tajin brings 
back such an account as will encourage it in its for- 
eign policy. It is, perhaps, better in some respects 
that the first attempt to break through the policy 
of the empire should be by sending a private agent, 
who can report without further committing the gov- 
ernment; see other lands, as it were, with his own 
eyes, and test, in some degree, the descriptions that 
have been given it of those regions. It seems to 
me desirable, therefore, that while the party sees 
whatever is deemed most worthy its inspection, no 
great eclat should be made during its short stay 
in America. Since the appointment was made the 
Foreign Ofiice has been much pleased at the appro- 
bation unexpectedly evinced by other high ofiicials 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 59 

in Peking at the move, and consequently their in- 
terest in its result will be increased.^ 

But China was in no real sense ready for the 
results of such an adventure. An infinitesimal 
minority of her governing class had profited, 
indeed, by the instructions of a few foreigners 
and adjusted themselves to their novel position 
in relation to Western countries; yet there was 
no such agreement between Oriental and Occi- 
dental as these friendly interviews at the for- 
eign office seemed to imply. Even if there had 
been, the essentially democratic nature of Chi- 
nese control would have made it impossible for 
the central authority at Peking to impose a 
totally new policy upon the empire — as Japan 
was doing at the time — without first converting 
the literati class throughout the country. Pin, 
as it transpired, was a mere pawn pushed for- 
ward upon the chess-board of Chinese politics; 
he was not even allowed by the obscurantists 
to publish a report upon what he had seen. 
His interest to Us lies solely in the fact that in 
sending him abroad the government admitted 
that it could do such a thing; but his "mission" 
was hailed at the time by foreigners as the har- 

1 Williams to Seward, March 10, 1866. One of the attaches of this 
party, Chang Teh-ming, served subsequently as Chinese minister to 
Great Britain. The "mission" is described in Miss Bredon's "Sir 
Robert Hart," London, 1909, pp. 112/. 



/ 
/ 



60 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

binger of a new era, and "commended so warmly 
by the foreign ministers to their governments 
that the emissary was received hke the Queen 
of Sheba by King Solomon, and shown — at 
least in Great Britain — everything that was 
admirable from the Western point of view. He 
was as far, however, from appreciating the tri- 
umphs of science as was Cetewayo the Zulu, 
whose admiration of England focussed itself on 
the elephant Jumbo at the Zoological Gardens."^ 
It is easier, however, to philosophise upon the 
vanity of expectation a generation after the 
event than to foresee the sterility of a hope 
before it is proved to be baseless. The time had 
not yet come to despair, although on Mr. Bur- 
lingame's return to Peking the foreign envoys 
there had begun to realise that it was useless to 
anticipate great results from their attempts to 
infuse vigour into the Central Government. Its 
policy of inertia seemed at once the easiest and 
most effective means of withstanding the de- 
mands of those preposterous outsiders. "The 
stimulus or the fear (writes Mr. Williams, 
August 10, 1866), caused by the approach of 
foreign troops to Peking six years ago is losing 
its former potency. It is very wearisome to be 
obliged to constantly urge the members of the 

1 Michie, "The Englishman in China," II, p. 137. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 61 

Foreign Office to do their duty, and oblige 
the local authorities to fulfil treaty stipulations 
whenever our citizens suffer wrong, while, at the 
same time, one feels that they either cannot, 
or will not, or dare not, act efficiently. I think 
sometimes that they have become utterly dis- 
couraged with the multiplicity and urgency of 
the questions and grievances brought before 
them for settlement and reparation." If the 
few officials friendly to foreigners had fallen 
away from their earlier rapprochement during Mr. 
Burlingame's absence, it was true conversely 
that a growing indifference was shown by his 
confreres in the legations toward his idea of 
co-operation. The practical disability of this 
idea arose from its moral elevation; it was, in a 
way, a counsel of perfection requiring not only 
patience, but repression, to effect its perfect 
work, and repression involved the restraint of 
impatient groups of merchants at the ports, 
who had from the outset flouted any notions of 
morality in dealing with Asiatics. 

In the important matter of amending the 
scandal of coolie emigration from China, the 
foreign ministers found a comprehensive national 
agreement difficult at first, but they pursued, 
on the whole, a consistent and creditable policy, 
which after some years stopped the evils of 



K 



62 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

kidnapping and deporting Chinese labourers. 
Other questions were not so obviously deter- 
mined by plain ethical principles. The regula- 
tion of pilotage at the open ports, for example, 
had been rendered difficult by jealousies among 
European pilots, the English especially claim- 
ing, with the consent of their minister, that 
British ships should be brought in only by Brit- 
ish pilots, while these were also to be allowed 
to serve the ships of other nations. Here again, 
after some friendly discussion, the business was 
not only amicably concluded, but was made 
the basis of a larger determination. Mr. Bur- 
lingame 

opposed these regulations as illegal and unjust. 
This view was entertained by the French, Prussian, 
and Russian representatives, as well as by Sir Ed- 
mond Hornby, the British chief-justice at Shanghai. 
Sir Rutherford finally suspended the regulations 
from operation. We thereupon entered into rela- 
tions with the Chinese Government with the view 
of adopting a uniform system which might be sup- 
ported by all. Mr. Hart, inspector-general of cus- 
toms, had previously suggested that all matters 
relating to pilotage should be placed under the con- 
trol of the commissioner of Chinese customs. This 
suggestion was, after much discussion, unanimously 
adopted — first as a matter of right to the Chinese, 
and second as a matter of convenience to our- 
selves. The result was the preparation and adop- 
tion of the fifteen regulations herewith sent. These 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 63 

were mainly drawn by Mr. Bellonet, French charge 
d'affaires.^ 

Mr. Hart's sensible proposal, that all matters 
pertaining to the conduct of foreign shipping in 
Chinese waters be placed in charge of the im- 
perial customs service, comprised as a corollary 
relegating the tonnage dues for building light- 
houses, setting buoys, dredging, etc., the results 
of which have been the present admirably marked 
and lighted harbour entrances along the China 
coast — an illustration of the justice of Mr. 
Burlingame's contention that a "matter of right 
to the Chinese" involved a "convenience to 
ourselves." ^ 

The inevitable conclusion had been forced 
upon his mind during six years of close obser- 

^ Burlingame to Seward, May 1, 1867. 

^ His loniform agreement with and approval of all that Mr. Hart advo- 
cated for the betterment of China's position is rather striking. He saw 
nothing necessarily inimical to his own country that conveyed an ad- 
vantage to China. In conj action with his colleagues he urged upon the 
Chinese the importance of telegraphs and railways, but he wisely re- 
fused to press the matter against their scruples, however inconsequent 
these seemed. In their gratitude for his services in the Lay-Osborn 
Flotilla affair the Tsung-li Yamen assented verbally (in March, 1865) 
to the laying of an American cable along the coast from Canton to 
Shanghai, touching at the various treaty ports. " This is the only thing," 
he writes, "resembling a grant ever made to any one. It should be 
understood that a grant to me, under the favoured-nation clause, is a 
grant to all. The first to occupy the ground will have the advantage, 
but more than this I cannot say. I have persistently refused to advise 
the company, or any one else, to risk money; and however much I should 
be pleased as a patriot to have Americans build the first line, I must 
still respectfully hold that position." (Burlingame to Seward, May 22, 
1867.) 



64 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

vatlon, that no real revolution in Chinese polity 
could be expected except from the slow process 
of education. Wars and "object lessons" had 
driven the government only so far as fear could 
force them; they had failed to convict them of 
unsound or discreditable conceptions of states- 
craft. For this reason he reports with charac- 
teristic enthusiasm two memorials to the throne, 
recommending the establishment of a govern- 
ment college for instruction in the arts and sci- 
ences of the West. The proposition owed its 
inception to Mr. Hart, and contemplated at first 
merely the expansion of the Tung-Wen Kwan, a 
school of languages instituted in 1862, and con- 
ducted by the distinguished American Sinologue, 
Dr. W. A. P. Martin. Like other promising 
projects in China it failed, through the rancour 
and obstruction of the literati, to meet the ex- 
pectations of its sponsors or to develop, as was 
hoped, into a true university where Chinese 
and Western courses of instruction could be 
merged into the same curriculum. It is un- 
necessary to enter here into the history of the 
Tung-Wen Kwan until its suppression at the 
crisis of the Boxer outbreak; it accomplished 
all that was possible in the face of offijftal an- 
tagonism and lack of support from even those 
who pretended to be friendly, but the argu- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 65 

ments advanced in the memorial advocating 
its enlargement in 1867 are the same which 
China has since acknowledged to be the founda- 
tion for her existing educational policy. These 
arguments, revealing the better side of Chinese 
character, to which Mr. Burlingame was always 
quick to respond, were welcomed by him as an 
indication of the success already achieved by the 
line of conduct he advocated. 

Could there be a greater evidence of progress than 
is disclosed by these papers? I marvel as I read 
them, and call your attention to them with infinite 
pleasure. When I came to China, in 1861, the force 
policy was the rule. It was said: "the Chinese are 
conceited barbarians, and must be forced into our 
civilisation"; or, in the energetic language of the 
time, it was said, "you must take them by the 
throat." Fortunately, the representatives of the 
treaty powers did not listen to this view. Conspicu- 
ous among these was Sir Frederick Bruce, the Brit- 
ish minister, who with his colleagues said that if 
force was ever necessary the day for it was over; 
that we were in relations for the first time with the 
chiefs of the government, and that it was necessary 
to proffer fair diplomatic action as a substitute for 
the old views, and to so bear ourselves as to secure 
the confidence of this people. Accordingly, the pol- 
icy was adopted of which you have been advised 
so often, and which you have approved so fully. 
Under this policy great development has occurred, 
missions have extended, trade has increased three- 
fold, scientific men have been employed, " Wheaton's 



66 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

International Law" translated and adopted, mili- 
tary instruction accepted, nearly one hundred able 
men received into the civil service, steam-boats mul- 
tiplied, the way slowly opened for future telegraphs 
and railroads, and now we have this great movement 
for education. Against this movement there has 
been continued opposition among the Chinese, and 
it has been frequently endangered by the inconsid- 
erate action of foreigners impatient of delay; but 
there has been no successful reaction, and the inten- 
tion of those now in authority is to go cautiously 
and steadily forward.^ 

There has never been a moment since these 
hopeful lines were written when some of her own 
earnest and patriotic sons did not desire China 
to "go cautiously and steadily forward." Could 
they have counted upon the author of this dis- 
patch during the years of reaction that were to 
follow, when new antagonisms and well-founded 
fears of partition by European powers paralysed 
their plans for reform, it is not impossible that, 
under the segis of this man's influence, China 
might have accepted their leadership and accom- 
plished her great task without incurring chastise- 
ment at the hands of friend and foe alike. 

Of the missionary problem — called by Sir 
Rutherford Alcock "the main cause of disturb- 

^ Burlingame to Seward, April 10, 1867. The memorials referred to 
are printed in full after the dispatch and are abundantly worth perusal 
as specimens of sound reasoning applied to meet the arguments of the 
opposition. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 67 

ance in our relations with China, and of danger 
to the Chinese Government itself no less than 
to all the foreigners resident in the country" — 
little is seen in Mr. Burlingame's published cor- 
respondence. The reason for this may be con- 
sidered to be the same as that which renders 
the history of most happy states dull; in this 
decade of planting new missionary stations in 
the empire the suspicions and collisions inevita- 
ble in a religious propaganda had not developed 
into a recognised opposition. The first revela- 
tion to the Chinese mind of possible dangers 
involved in militant Christianity appears to have 
come with the French punitive expedition to 
Korea, in 1866, when M. de Bellonet, the charge, 
demanded that China, as suzerain of that state, 
should punish her ruler for the slaughter of 
Catholic priests and converts there, failing 
which he declared his resolve to take the affair 
into his own hands and annex the Hermit King- 
dom to France.^ 

The Tientsin massacre of 1870 may not un- 
justly be accounted a sequel to this stroke of 
French policy. In their first efforts to secure 

^ The expedition was a melancholy failure by which France may be 
said to have "messed things" for Europeans of all nationalities in the 
Far East. "It revealed," says Mr. Michie, "the innermost hearts of 
the foreigners with a vividness not to be forgotten; it was the whole 
missionary question, from the Eastern point of view, in a nut-shell. 
To violate the laws and teach the natives to do so, and then appeal to 



68 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

redress for this outrage, which occurred, it will 
be remembered, in the opening month of the 
Franco-Prussian War, the French appealed to 
the co-operative principle; but in their action 
since that time there has been no further sign 
of their acceptance of that plan so far as mis- 
sionary activities are concerned. This, however, 
was a development of international relations 
with China subsequent to Mr. Burlingame's 
career. It may be an idle speculation to guess 
what his presence in Peking might have effected 
in influencing Chinese policy after 1871, but 
what his attitude would have been toward 
"aggressive" apostles of the faith may be in- 
ferred from his statement to Mr. Seward (May 
27, 1867): "You will observe that in my dis- 
patch to the members of the Foreign Office 
I disclaim the right to interfere between the 
Chinese and their own authorities in questions 
submitted to the Chinese legal tribunals, and 
that in my letter to our consul, Mr. Lord, while 
I propose to maintain treaty stipulations, I in- 
timate that the Chinese Christians should not 

foreign governments to back tliem in this Insidious form of rebellion ^ 
that was the function of the missionaries. The foreign government 
thereupon lays claim to the territory, and so the conspiracy is crowned. 
In the face of such an unveiling of motives, the chance of the Chinese 
statesmen being led by the friendly counsel poured constantly into their 
ears by the foreign ministers in Peking must have been small indeed." 
(A. Michie, "The Englishman in China," vol. II, p. 177. See also 
"United States Diplomatic Correspondence," 1867, II, p. 419.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 69 

be encouraged to expect protection by forcible 
intervention on the part of the United States. 
This is the only course to pursue unless we are 
prepared to enter in China upon armed propa- 
gandism." The American missionaries in Ningpo 
had in this case appealed through their consul 
to the minister to check by his interference a 
rising anti-foreign spirit, as shown there in the 
persecution of converts in secular charges by 
local authorities. The aggravations arising out 
of such cases are certainly very great. The 
question is too complex to be dismissed by 
the historian with the easy reflection that the 
minister's advice, render unto Csesar the things/ 
that are Caesar's, would, if consistently followed, 
have been the cure-all for thirty years of trouble 
which ensued. Yet experience in China has on 
the whole justijfied the Burlingame position as 
the right one — that native converts cannot be 
profitably protected from their own officials by ^ 
foreigners, even when they suffer unjustly for 
the truth's sake. 

From this summary of his official relations it 
is scarcely an exaggerated estimate to discern in 
Mr. Burlingame the adviser who, more than any 
other, saved China in the period of her greatest 
peril from the sort of national shipwreck which 
Korea has met in recent years through similar 



70 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

recalcitrance and ignorance of foreign states 
and their power. In defence of this contention 
it is not necessary to call him a negotiator in- 
tellectually supreme above his fellows; he had, 
as it happened, just the qualities adapted to 
his task. Such genius as he possessed was ap- 
plied to the highest advantage where a policy 
depended for its success upon certain principles 
clearly conceived and persistently maintained. 
He was effective, as has been shown, through 
proclivities of mind and disposition rather than 
by reason of training in the traditions of diplo- 
matic intercourse between the states of Christen- 
dom; but, for the manner in which he reached 
conclusions well justified by subsequent experi- 
ence, and in dealing with novel and unexpected 
conditions, he deserves the title of a diplomatist 
of original and constructive talent. His success 
was secured by the exercise of patience and re- 
serve under circumstances that were often difii- 
cult and almost always aggravating. His in- 
fluence endured because he was determined to 
allow nothing to disturb the confidence already 
won from the statesmen with whom he was 
commissioned to deal, and never greatly to an- 
ticipate their desires. He perceived that their 
reluctance was not necessarily the result of 
bigotry, that the habits and conservatism of 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 71 

centuries could not be reversed in an hour. If 
China was to remain an independent power, 
there was really no legitimate alternative to his 
plan; if she was not, America had little to hope 
and everything to lose from a contrary policy 
of armed intervention and subjugation by Eu- 
ropean rivals. And if from motives of sym- 
pathy and sagacity Mr. Burlingame became 
sponsor for this policy, the logic of his reason- 
ing was discreetly acknowledged by the repre- 
sentatives of Great Britain. 

If foreign powers (writes Sir Rutherford Alcock, 
the British minister) would guide and not coerce this 
people, they must begin by convincing and persuad- 
ing them. If it be a question of compulsion, and 
forcing upon them changes in their system of govern- 
ment and administration, backed by such foreign 
appliances as railroads and telegraphs, the treaty 
powers should be prepared to take upon themselves 
the whole responsibility of the measures and pro- 
vide their own machinery for governing the huge 
empire under a protectorate, or a general dismember- 
ment and division of the fragments. Conquest and 
occupation have been spoken of; but it is difficult 
to see to what uses — political, military, or com- 
mercial — any portion of China could be applied 
by European powers; and if not prepared to enter 
upon an enterprise of this kind, they should be slow 
to adopt a policy paralysing all national develop- 
ment and directly leading to such an issue. ^ 

^Alcock to Lord Stanley, December 23, 1867. ("Parliamentary 
Papers, China, no. 5 (1871)," p. 84.) 



X 



72 ANSON BURLINGAME 

At the time of Mr. Burlingame's arrival in 
China the foreign envoys had, as we have seen, 
decided to stand by the Imperial Government in 
its efforts to check the Tai-ping insurrection, an 
uprising which was manifestly a revolt against 
law and order. Had they decided otherwise 
and let anarchy have its way for a time — losing 
in the turmoil their trade and all other interests 
in the empire for perhaps a generation — they 
might have had at last a tabula rasa upon which 
to write a new constitution for another China. 
But in electing to support the old regime, clogged 
as it was with corruption and irrational miscon- 
ceptions, they were logically bound to await the 
slow process of regeneration to be effected by 
educating a people, and by the gradual intro- 
duction without violence of new methods which 
would commend themselves to an awakened 
nation. This postulate the Western traders, 
anxious as to cash profits, could not understand, 
nor would they credit the grievous disabilities 
under which the government laboured. Influ- 
enced by selfish desires, Europeans were, for the 
most part, as blind to the real issues as were the 
Chinese to the advantages offered them from 
abroad. It required a man of uncommon equa- 
nimity to stand firmly against the aggressiveness 
of one party and the repugnance of the other. 



THE GENESIS OF THE MISSION 

SOME understanding of the cross-currents 
and conflicting purposes inevitable in the 
conduct of such a governmental system as 
that of China may be derived from a perusal 
of the correspondence already examined. Since 
the opening of Peking the government and dom- 
inant class in China had striven tenaciously 
against foreign aggression, and if little had been 
gained, in their estimation, the foreigners had, 
at all events, been halted in their advance and 
secured no further concessions of territory or 
privilege. But while the Chinese were a unit 
in opposing any advent of foreign control, there 
were variations both in attitude and purpose 
among their parties. As Prince Kung and his 
coadjutors in the Tsung-li Yamen had received 
enlightenment through personal intercourse with 
the official representatives of foreign states, so 
the tradesmen at the ports, through a profitable 
interchange of commodities, had acquired some 
appreciation of the value of the foreigner's trade, 

and even some toleration for his mechanical con- 

73 



74 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

trivances and standards of material comfort. 
Between these two groups lay the vast bolus of 
an educated but unenlightened China, ignorant 
alike of the substantive weakness of their own 
country and of the strength of others, satisfied 
with a culture which had dominated half a con- 
tinent for thirty centuries, as fiercely jealous of 
the native who conceded a single point to the 
adversary as of the enemy himself and his hate- 
ful conceits. And as far above all of these as 
the inscrutable proletariat was below, stood the 
palace, invisible to the eye of the outsider as it 
was inviolable to every new idea, a nursery of 
corruption, powerful in exalting or demolishing 
individuals, but incapable, through its ignorance 
of real conditions, of pursuing a consistent policy. 
The actual governing power was thus rendered 
impersonal, and shuffled from hand to hand, 
with no one who could be held specifically re- 
sponsible for its effectiveness. 

The end of the decade was to bring with it the 
date upon which a general revision of the com- 
mercial provisions of the British treaty of Tien- 
tsin might be demanded.^ The British Govern- 
ment does not appear to have been eager to 

^ The French treaty gave twelve years from the date of its ratification, 
which would have made its revision due in 1873. Of course the most- 
favoured-nation clause made any advantages secured by one nation the 
common possession of all. In this case the others proposed to stand by 
and let her Majesty's representative negotiate. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 75 

attack a problem hedged about with difficulties, 
nor did its envoy. Sir Rutherford Alcock, advo- 
cate the attempt. "The question arises," he 
argues, "if nothing is to be gained by demanding 
a revision which may not be as well obtained 
without — whether much would not be lost, 
and an opportunity thrown away which might, 
by reserving the right, be turned to better ac- 
count when the Emperor's majority is declared. 
I believe the true policy of foreign powers would 
be to wait." ^ 

Such revision as the foreigners contemplated 
necessarily involved correction of abuses and 
further privileges that implicated the provincial 
governments and affected the settled polity of 
China. No great constitutional change can be 
rightly estimated from one stand-point alone. 
There are always at least two aspects : its imme- 
diate effects, which may be partially foreseen, 
and the indirect results of the new forces set in 
motion, which no one can measure. The mat- 
ter is further complicated if cognisance must 
be taken of extraneous pressure. In the case of 

1 Alcock to Lord Stanley, November 15, 1867. "Correspondence Re- 
specting the Revision of the Treaty of Tientsin," 1871, p. 56 — a dis- 
patch full of wisdom. "No nation," he declares in the same paper, 
"likes the interference of a foreign power in its internal affairs, however 
well-intentioned it may be, and China is no exception to the rule. On 
the contrary, their pride of race, and what they conceive to be a real 
superiority in civilisation to all outside nations, renders them peculiarly 
restive imder the goad of foreign impulsion." 



76 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

China the uncertainty of any fundamental alter- 
ation brought about through foreign dictation 
has been greatly increased by their ignorance 
of her real needs and their indifference to the 
sensibilities of the people. However imperfect 
their administrative system in the eyes of Euro- 
peans, the fact remains that it has served its 
purpose and its people extraordinarily well. Its 
service and long continuance are not, indeed, 
reasons for leaving it untouched by new influ- 
ences, but the gravity of altering the relations 
between rulers and people in such a vast com- 
monwealth demands extreme precautions. First 
among these would seem to be the necessity of 
recognising the fact that despite her autocratic 
forms China is really ruled with the consent of 
the governed. The mass of the common popu- 
lation believe profoundly in their ancient tradi- 
tions and in customs and "superstitions" which 
Western peoples deride. In view of their inde- 
pendence and of the enormous resisting power 
of this mass the imposition of great innovations 
against its desire induces fierce and persistent 
opposition directly menacing the existence of the 
government. The small group of enlightened 
officials who were willing to encourage the in- 
troduction of such foreign inventions as might 
be adapted/ to the needs of China found them- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 77 

selves, then, confronted not by a theory but by 
a situation. To force these changes upon the 
economic and social life of the Emperor's sub- 
jects before either rulers or people were prepared 
for them was to court revolution. Not only was 
the reluctance of these advanced officials justi- 
fied, but it became the duty of the representa- 
tives of those foreign nations who wished to see 
the unity of China preserved, to assist them in 
withstanding proposals that might discredit and 
ruin the empire. Short of this the diplomatic 
body in Peking could not stop consistently, with 
the Burlingame policy of "let alone" openly 
avowed by the Four B's and approved by their 
governments. To act otherwise was to plunge 
China once more into the abyss of anarchy from 
which their own statesmanship in the Tai-ping 
rebellion had rescued her. 

If, however, the alternative of a break-up of 
China was discarded — as it had been — there 
remained the other course, that of intervention 
to secure necessary reforms. As ofiicial cor- 
ruption and popular prejudices were the under- 
lying obstacles to a proper observance of the 
treaties, the domestic politics of the empire be- 
came an object of concern to the foreign powers. 
Success in so delicate a business as this, con- 
fronted as they were by the superciliousness of 



78 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the palace and the precipitancy of the treaty 
ports, demanded harmony among the foreign 
governments upon the principles at issue. This 
was the other element of the Burlingame policy, 
the co-operative idea, seen to be more and more 
essential if China was to be preserved intact. 
Race antagonism and a certain contempt for 
Asiatics entertained by most Caucasians had de- 
veloped a predilection for arbitrary methods on 
the part of the European mercantile class in the 
Far East, but the attitude of their governments 
had thus far been favourable to maintaining a 
fair field for the independent governments of 
China and Japan. Happily no question of fron- 
tiers in the remoter parts of Asia had become 
acute at that time, as in the case of the Near 
East, and the number of powers intimately 
involved was limited. Their merchants could 
easily be made to recognise the inexpediency of 
imperilling business by bringing on anarchy. 
The political situation could be saved if the two 
policies identified with Mr. Burlingame could be 
faithfully continued and the merchants shown 
that another course meant loss. Complications 
which the future would bring, with its increased 
facilities for transportation and more numerous 
competitors in the trade, might destroy forever 
such an opportunity for co-operation as this. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 79 

The author of these pohcies became thus their 
logical exponent before the world. 

Some indecision is evident on the part both 
of China and Great Britain during the year 1867. 
But in facing the unknown in human affairs the 
most difficult thing to do is to wait. Unhappily, 
while Mr. Burlingame had been absent from his 
post there was no advocate either in London or 
Peking of the let-alone policy sufficiently exalted 
to enforce the admirable reasoning of Sir Ruth- 
erford and compel a course on the one hand of 
refraining from meddling and dictation, and on 
the other, of submitting Western culture to con- 
siderate study. Pandora's box was opened on 
the very inadequate premise that "it was time 
something was done." To prepare for a discus- 
sion that was not necessarily immanent memo- 
rials on the subject of their grievances were in- 
vited by the British legation from its nationals in 
the open ports ; the minds of all Europeans and of 
the watchful Chinese became tense. An analysis 
of their wants showed "three or four cardinal 
defects, not of the treaties so much, as in their 
execution." These pertained to inland and local 
taxes on foreign goods, facilities of access and 
communication with the interior of China, — 
which involved, of course, pleas for the intro- 
duction of steam locomotion and telegraphs, — 



/ 



80 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

privileges for working mines, and the establish- 
ment of an international tribunal with securities 
for execution of awards against Chinese debtors 
or defaulters. Anticipating, now, some formal 
consideration of these desires, British merchants 
naturally exerted all the pressure they could to 
bring about a general revisal of those checks and 
restraints under which trade had been conducted 
since the Arrow War. By the end of 1867 the 
Chinese and foreign elements engaged in com- 
merce were profoundly stirred by the hopes and 
fears involved in a rearrangement of the status 
quo. 

In the complex and delicate situation of 
parties — if such they may be called — in China 
at this time, it is impossible to deny that this 
bouleversement was an unfortunate hazard for her 
more progressive statesmen. It gave fresh am- 
munition to their opponents, the "Old Guard" 
of Chinese politics, and renewed former appre- 
hensions that the foreigners proposed to bring 
about a rupture which should involve new con- 
quests and further control. To the more re- 
sponsible among them this was a dreadful crisis. 
They credited all foreign nations alike with in- 
satiable avarice; they had really never under- 
stood why the invasions of 1840 and 1858 had 
been hurled against them; they saw that they 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 81 

were as helpless before Western attack now as 
ever before; they realised that the foreigners — 
*' barbarians who never considered justice" — 
had everything to gain and nothing to lose by 
instigating a fresh war. Goaded on by their fears 
and by the recriminations of their repulsive crit- 
ics, they called upon the satraps in the provinces 
for advice. All China, native and foreign alike, 
was agog. 

The secret circular addressed by the Tsung-li 
Yamen to the higher civil and military officials 
upon the barbarian question is of interest as ex- 
hibiting their view of the difficulties and dangers 
of the situation. They describe the foreigners 
as united in interest, while there was no one in 
the empire who could create disunion among 
them. It was necessary to be patient and 
humour them until such time as China might 
be vigorous enough to drive them all out of the 
country and return to her old isolation. Mean- 
time, a rupture must be avoided at all hazards, 
and to this end suggestions were required upon 
the topics likely to be discussed at the confer- 
ences upon a treaty revision. These points 
were: the demand for imperial audience, for an 
embassy or permanent missions to foreign coun- 
tries, telegraphs and railways, residence of Euro- 
pean merchants in the interior, mining and salt 
privileges, and Christian missions. All of the 



82 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

memorials received in answer to this invitation 
were characterised by sense and frankness, not 
unmixed, however, with fantastic proposals, the 
natural result of ignorance of the outer world. 
The replies of two viceroys may be briefly noted 
here as representing the best intelligence of 
China at this conjuncture. 

That of Tseng Kwo-fan begged "to suggest 
that in all our intercourse with foreign nations 
the most important things to be regarded are 
good faith and what is right, and perhaps even 
above these should be placed decision. Those 
things which we cannot yield should, from first 
to last, be firmly declared and not retracted 
under any circumstances; but those privileges 
which we can liberally yield might be made 
known to them in direct and plain terms." 
Against steamers, railways, and telegraphs he 
advanced the economic objection that native 
carriers and boatmen would be driven to star- 
vation, but he approved of opening mines and 
employing foreign machinery. As to the audi- 
ence, he rises to a position far in advance of 
his class and of the clique that controlled the 
Empresses-Dowager: "Our sacred dynasty, in its 
love of virtue and kindness to those from afar, 
has no desire to arrogate to itself the sway over 
the lands within the boundless oceans, or require 
that their ministers should render homage; and 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 83 

it will be suitable if, when your Majesty yourself 
takes the reins of government, they request an 
audience to grant it. The suitable presents and 
ceremonies can be settled at the time; for, as 
the envoys represent nations of equal rank, they 
need not be forced to do what is difficult." He 
also advocated sending embassies abroad if fit 
envoys could be found; "seeing that this point 
has for its object the honour and prosperity of 
his Majesty, and the smoothing over of diffi- 
culties, it seems best, on the whole, to accede 
to it." Christianity, he thought, would never ^ 
secure many converts in China, and might there- 
fore be discussed without bitterness or appre- 
hension for the future. " Should the day come," 
he concludes, "when China gets the ascendant 
and foreign nations decay and grow weak, we 
then should only seek to protect our own black- \/ 
haired people, and have no wish to get mili- 
tary glory beyond the seas. Although they are 
crooked and deceitful, they yet know that reason 
and right cannot be gainsaid, and that the wrath 
of a people cannot be resisted. By employing a 
frank sincerity on our part we can, no doubt, 
move them to good ways, and then everything 
will be easily arranged to satisfaction." ^ 

^ " United States Diplomatic Correspondence," 1868, 1, p. 519. This 
and the following memorial were never published, but came into the 
bands of foreigners through yamen runners. Sir R. Alcock subsequently 



84 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Li Hung-chang, at that time viceroy of the 
Hu-Kwang, reported even more favourably than 
his colleague at Nanking upon the propositions 
submitted. He conceded the audience, envoys 
abroad, and the use of steam and electricity, as 
requests that might with propriety be granted, 
and considered the matter of extending mission- 
ary activity beset with greater difficulties than 
the rest, but not beyond settlement. He was, 
in fact, disposed to regard none of the questions 
as outside of the scope of amicable discussion, 
the danger in the situation being that foreigners 
might use force to extort concessions if not 
handled carefully. Yet he credited none of the 
nations (except Russia) with a desire to divide 
and occupy China, "for the reason that, with 
the exception of Russia, foreign countries are 
all too distant from China, and the acquisition 
of its territory would be nothing but an em- 
barrassment to them." ^ Perhaps the most sig- 

wrote some valuable comments upon them in his articles entitled 
"Chinese Statesmen and State Papers." "It goes far to prove the 
authenticity of this document, although it cannot be strictly vouched 
for, that the negotiations which followed for the revision of the treaty 
the year after were carried on by the Tsung-li Yamen very much in the 
spirit here recommended, and otherwise in perfect accordance with the 
advice tendered. On all matters not involving, as they conceived, the 
peace and security of the people, either by their startling novelty or 
sudden displacement of capital and labour, they yielded with a good 
grace; on others, such as railroads, telegraphs, the admission of salt, 
and unrestricted residence in the interior, they resisted steadily, and 
were immovable." {Fortnightly Review, May, 1871.) 
1 He learned better before he died. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 85 

nificant item in Li's memorial was his advice 
to Chinese officials to cultivate intimacies with 
foreigners. This had been his own practice; 
"he has found that no matter what they are 
engaged in, they act honourably without deceit 
or falsehood. But, although it is possible to 
acquire a general knowledge of their own affairs, 
yet there is no means of becoming thoroughly 
acquainted with the details and motives of their 
conduct." ^ 

The sense and candour of these two memorials, 
though characterising only the most advanced 
thought of the time, reveal the sagacity to be 
found among Chinese statesmen of the higher 
class and give the lie at once to aspersions — 
still too common — upon their "childishness" 
and deceit. Their tone is quite that of memo- 
rials which were presented to the government of 
Japan at that time, and ultimately acted upon 
to her great advantage. So far from being 
"hide-bound in their arrogance," these officials 
acknowledged the physical superiority of for- 
eign nations, and upon that knowledge they 
based their advocacy of regeneration to save 
themselves from foreign conquest. They show 
that a true education in affairs vital to their 



^The document is very freely translated in Michie's "Englishman in 
China," II, pp. 185-191. 



86 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

interests had been progressing since 1860, and 
that time alone was needed for men of this type 
to convert the recalcitrant majority of Chinese 
oflScialdom to their views. The same leaven 
which was to work the wonder of the nineteenth 
century in centralised Japan was fermenting in 
/decentralised China, where it was necessary to 

. / carry conviction to the minds of all her educated 
classes before the empire could be aroused to 
action. Because the foreigners did not under- 
stand this, because they were too impatient to 
wait, they abandoned a policy which had been 
advocated with such tenacity and purpose by 
Mr. Burlingame and his associates, and presently 

■/■ drove the conservative opposition to assume a 
new lease of control over China. The visible 
sign of this reversion among the people was an 
epidemic of anti-foreign demonstrations in the 
provinces;^ its manifestation on the part of the 
Tsung-li officials was their sudden and rather 
desperate decision to send an embassy to the 
Christian powers, and entreat their further pa- 
tience for a slowly awakening nation. 

^ These occurred during the ensuing years, culminating in the famous 
Tientsin massacre of June, 1870. One in Yangchow, in September, 
1868, instigated by the literati, one in Taiwan, Formosa, in December, an 
attack on missionary buildings at Nanking by students in the same 
month, another upon a British boat's crew by villagers near Swatow, in 
January, 1869, and another at the same time on a Catholic community 
in the province of Szechwan. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 87 

Conjecture was rife among foreigners in China 
at the time as to her probable reason for cre- 
ating such an embassy. The fact that it was 
quickly resolved made them conclude the exist- 
ence of some fresh and impelling motive. They 
did not reflect that with autocratic rulers such 
decisions are not infrequently the outcome of 
sudden inspirations, and that it is only the long 
debate demanded by constitutionally governed 
states which prohibits an impulsive venture. 
Suggestions to this end had been made often 
enough both by foreigners and their own offi- 
cials, so that the project itself could hardly be 
a novelty to the Imperial Government. The 
Empress-Dowager Tsz Hsi was impulsive by 
temperament and quick to act when mastered 
by a new resolve. Her confidence in Prince Kung 
was at the time complete. We have seen that 
his feeling toward Mr. Burlingame was rather 
more kindly than toward any other foreigner at 
the capital, and that he looked upon him as a 
friend of China. In the absence of any docu- 
mentary evidence upon the court view of the 
incident, it does not require much subtlety to 
infer that when the Prince proposed sending such 
an advocate of China to foreign countries, the 
Empress acquiesced in the suggestion as a ven- 
ture in which there could be little risk of loss 



88 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

and might be a handsome prospect of gain. To 
one of smaller intellectual calibre such a step 
would have been repugnant merely because it 
was unprecedented, but we know now that the 
master-mind of China during the past half- 
century repeatedly acted in this way.^ 

The genesis of the Chinese Mission to the for- 
eign powers is best set forth in the documents 
published in the "Diplomatic Correspondence 
of the United States," and presently to be 
quoted. After resigning his post as American 
minister by telegram to the secretary of state 
"in the interests of my country and civilisa- 
tion," on November 21, 1867, Mr. Burlingame 
proceeded by cart with his family and a few 
friends on the 25th to Tientsin. It was char- 
acteristic of the disordered state of China at 
that time that the party should be threatened 
by a band of mounted brigands, and compelled 
to find safety in a village en route; it was 
equally characteristic of the habits of foreign- 
ers living in China that help should be sought 
from the legations in Peking and from a British 

1 Two recent biographies enable us to make some historical estimate 
of her: Bland and Backhouse, "China Under the Empress Dowager," 
and P. W. Sergeant, "The Great Empress Dowager of China." It may 
have been remembered in the palace that an embassy sent by Japan to 
the European powers in 1861 to request a postponement of the dates 
when their treaties should come in force had been successful in delay- 
ing the opening of Hyogo and Niigata as trade ports for five years. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 89 

gunboat lying at Tientsin, while the Imperial 
Government, whose ambassador was supposed 
to be in personal danger, did nothing at all be- 
cause it was not notified of the matter. During 
a stay of a month in Shanghai awaiting the 
Chinese members of the Mission, who thought 
it more prudent to repair thither by mule-cart 
rather than by steamer, Mr. Burlingame, visited^^i 
the Viceroy Tseng Kwo-fan at Nanking. Had 
that statesman, at the time the greatest man in 
China, cared to indorse the Mission he might 
have given it a national character. As it was, 
he considered it a palace experiment with which 
the provinces had no concern, and, while receiv- 
ing the ambassador with civility, gave no pub- 
lic indication of his approval.^ From Shanghai 
Mr. Burlingame sent Mr. Seward the following 
account of his appointment: 

You will have learned from my telegram from 
Peking of my appointment by the Chinese Govern- 
ment as "envoy" to the treaty powers, and of my 
acceptance of the same. The facts in relation to the 

1 During his absence in Nanking the edict creating the Mission was 
published. From a contemporary account we learn that while at 
Shanghai "the high mandarins and government officials in the region 
round about called on Mr. Burlingame, and manifested in every way 
the extreme respect in which they held him in consequence of the posi- 
tion in which he had been confirmed and the unprecedented dignity 
conferred upon him. It was found impossible to prevent them from 
prostrating themselves before him, and he could only remain passive 
and receive their attentions." ("American Annual Cyclopaedia.") 



90 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

appointment are as follows: I was on the point of 
proceeding to the treaty ports of China to ascertain 
what changes our citizens desired to have made in 
the treaties, provided a revision should be deter- 
mined upon, after which it was my intention to re- 
sign and go home. The knowledge of this intention 
coming to the Chinese, Prince Kung gave a fare- 
well dinner, at which great regret was expressed at 
my resolution to leave Chiiia, and urgent requests 
made that I would, like Sir Frederick Bruce, state 
China's difficulties, and inform the treaty powers of 
their sincere desire to be friendly and progressive. 
This I cheerfully promised to do. During the con- 
versation Wensiang, a leading man of the empire, 
said, "Why will you not represent us officially?" 
I repulsed the suggestion playfully, and the con- 
versation passed to other topics. 

Subsequently I was informed that the Chinese 
were most serious, and a request was made through 
Mr. Brown, Chinese secretary of the British lega- 
tion, that I should delay my departure for a few 
days, until a proposition could be submitted to me. 
I had no further conversation with them until the 
proposition was made in form, requesting me to ^ct 
for them as ambassador to all the treaty powers^ I 
had in the interim thought anxiously upon the sub- 
ject, and, after consultation with my friends, deter- 
mined, in the interests of our country and civili- 
sation, to accept. The moment the position was 
formally tendered I informed my colleagues of all 
the facts, and am happy to say that they approved 
of the action of the Chinese, and did all they could 
to forward the interests of the Mission. J. McLeavy 
Brown, Esq., Chinese secretary of the British lega- 
tion, was persuaded, in the common interest, to 




THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 91 



act as first secretary to the Mission, and Mr. Des- 
champs, a French gentleman, who had accompanied 
Ping on a visit to Europe, was selected as second 
secretary. Two Chinese gentlemen of the highest 
rank were selected from the Foreign Office to conduct 
the Chinese correspondence, and as "learners." My 
suite will number about thirty persons. I shall 
leave for the United States by the February steamer 
for California. I limit myself in this note to the 
above brief history of the Mission, reserving my 
reasons for accepting it to a personal interview at 
Washington. 

I may be permitted to add that when the oldest 
nation in the world, containing one-third of the 
human race, seeks, for the first time, to come into 
relations with the West, and requests the youngest 
nation, through Hs representative, to act as the 
medium of such change, the mission is not one to 
be solicited or rejected. 

Among foreigners in the open ports this un- 
expected action of a government which had 
been written down as recalcitrant in all matters 
affecting "progress" was at first cordially ap- 
proved. Opinion changed when the event be- 
lied their expectations, and Shanghai became 
subsequently the seat and centre of criticism 
hostile to the Mission. It is interesting, how- 
ever, to observe that the earlier impressions 
formed at that port of Chinese motives for its 
creation were those which are likely to be ac- 
cepted as the true ones. The Tsung-li oflScials, 



92 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

they surmised, were sincerely sorry to lose in 
Mr. Burlingame the last of the four foreign 
ministers with whom personal diplomatic inter- 
r course had begun in the capital after the estab- 
I lishment of peace. The Chinese were aware 
that their national predicament was not realised 
abroad, and hoped that, after some intimate 
acquaintance with both their circumstances and 
intentions, Mr. Burlingame might be able to 
explain to other governments the dangers which 
must arise in China from forcing upon her sud- 
/ \/ den changes for which the majority of her ablest 
and most powerful classes were as yet unpre- 
pared. "The changes they had already intro- 
duced," writes a well-informed Shanghai resi- 
dent, "were really revolutionary, considering the 
condition of the empire; and while they were 
progressing, and willing to progress, they could 
not lose sight of the important fact that upon 
them devolved the responsibility of governing 
the empire and maintaining it in its integrity, 
whereas foreigners, who were free from any re- 
sponsibility whatever, and but very little ac- 
quainted with the wants and political condi- 
tion of China, called for changes without being 
themselves perfectly assured that these changes 
would not, as had already in some instances 
been the case, prove detrimental to their own 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 93 

interests. They further urged that it was not 
necessary, and would be very unwise, -to intro- 
duce every possible change that foreigners could 
conceive within the almost momentary space of 
ten years; but with a steady policy of gradual 
progress they would be able to advance with 
security to the empire, and with satisfaction to 
foreign governments, who fairly considered the 
dangers and difficulties of their position." ^ 

That Mr. Burlingame's quality of magnetism 
was not without influence even upon the for- 
eigners of Shanghai is evident from another 
paragraph by the same writer. There, as in 
Peking, he was the apostle of reasonableness, 
and the doctrine was novel enough to abate for 
a moment the distrust pervading the whole atti- 
tude of Europeans toward China. Hopes for 
better things to come could arouse these people 
to speak generously of the Chinese, but the self- 
ishness of these hopes entailed new bitterness 
in the end. "I am far from contending," con- 
tinues Robertson, " that there is no deceit in the 
Chinese heart, or that the Chinese are anxiously 

^ Letter dated January 8, 1868, published in the London Daily News, 
February 28, 1868, by its Shanghai correspondent, James Barr Robert- 
son. Its value lies not alone in the fact that he admirably represented 
Shanghai opinion, but that this outline of the Mission's origin was ob- 
tained from an interview with Mr. Burlingame, whose views he was 
willing at that time to publish as his own. Subsequent letters to the 
Daily News show Mr. Robertson and the Shanghai community in a very 
different temper. 



94 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

endeavouring to carry out in their integrity the 
views and wishes of foreigners; and I am far 
from thinking that foreigners should not en- 
deavour to secure beneficial concessions by up- 
Aght and liberal treatment of the Chinese. But 
considering how invariably concessions extorted 
by force are evaded by Europeans, and naturally 
and perhaps rightly so, can we expect that this 
haughty and egotistic nation will bend under 
the yoke in meek submission? If, armed with 
the common instincts of humanity, I were to 
place myself in the position of a Chinaman, I 
should, unless culpably negligent of my country's 
honour, feel bitter hostility to intruding for- 
eigners who might come to impose on my coun- 
try conditions favourable to their own trade 
simply because in the superiority of their strength 
they could compel me to submit. I might yield 
from motives of expediency, but would I hasten 
to drink the cup of my humiliation to the very 
dregs .^^ Yet, in spite of the overweening conceit 
of Chinese mandarins, they have taken some 
important steps which we are bound to interpret 
as signs of progress, and these probably in 
great measure because residence at Peking en- 
abled Sir Frederick Bruce and Mr. Burlingame 
to introduce with the ultimate depositories of 
power a peaceful and persuasive policy instead 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 95 

of the compulsory policy which had formerly 
prevailed amongst foreign powers in China. 
Whether these forward movements are due to 
foreign pressure more than to perfectly spon- 
taneous choice is of no very great consequence 
so long as they are accomplished facts brought 
about by peaceful means and without any need 
of resorting to force. They are valuable acquisi- 
tions for the moment, and they are an earnest 
of similar concessions for which we may not 
have long to wait." 

Some comments of interest to the historian of 
the Mission are contained in a dispatch from the 
American charge, Mr. Williams, to his govern- 
ment. Though arrangements for its composi- 
tion were all made in the ten days before Mr. 
Burlingame's departure from Peking, he thinks 
that "the Prince and other high functionaries 
had long debated the propriety of the step," 
and that "the ample powers given to him prove 
the importance that they attach to the Embassy." 
The mission of Pin to Europe in 1866, though 
otherwise barren of result,^ indicated their will- 
ingness to consider the matter of a properly 

^ He made, wrote J. Ross Browne, "a report suited to the views of 
his employers condemnatory of foreign improvements, and demonstrat- 
ing that such things are unsuited to China. In consequence of this he 
was promoted." A partial statement. Pin-Chun's confidential report 
was never published or seen by foreigners. (Dr. Martin's "Cycle of 
Cathay," p. 374.) 



96 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

accredited legation abroad; it was known, indeed, 
to a few foreigners in Peking that a similar 
proposition had been made two years before to 
Mr. Hart. "Some have not entirely approved 
of placing a foreigner at the head of it, but it 
seems to me to illustrate the practical character 
of this people to send as its representative one 
who would not be liable to the mistakes which 
would almost certainly be committed by the 
fittest and best educated native living. The 
Prince and his associates begin to feel that, in 
order to maintain their position, they must, as 
he intimates in his dispatch, send envoys to 
personally state their case at foreign courts, 
explain their difficulties, and urge the reasons 
for their own policy; and they are convinced 
that none of their own body are qualified for 
this office. The selection of Mr. Burlingame 
indicates their persuasion, therefore, that he will 
do for them better than they can yet do for them- 
selves. The proposed revision of the treaties 
next year is likely to bring up for consideration 
many important subjects for discussion, and this 
has no doubt its weight in deciding them to send 
him before those points are formally presented." 
Finally, in order to indicate the advance dur- 
ing a decade in the attitude of the imperial court 
toward the powers, he contrasts the terms of its 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 97 

envoy's commission with those employed in the 
two missives addressed by the Emperor to the 
President of the United States in 1858 and in 
1863. The first of these, sent by Hsien-feng to 
Mr. Reed, at Tientsin, begins: "I, the August 
Emperor, wish health to the President of the 
United States. Having received with profound 
respect the commands of Heaven to sway with 
tender care the entire circuit of all lands, we 
regard the people everywhere, within and with- 
out the wide sea, with the same humane be- 
nevolence"; . . . concluding: *'The minister of 
the United States is now at Tientsin, where he 
is negotiating with our high officers, and their 
intercourse has been mutually agreeable. As 
soon as their deliberations are concluded, he 
should return to Canton to attend to the com- 
mercial duties of his office as usual." The 
second, dated January 23, 1863, was the infant 
Emperor Tung-chih's acknowledgment of the 
President's letter, conveyed by Mr. Burlingame: 
"His Majesty the Emperor of the Ta-Tsing 
Dynasty salutes his Majesty the President of 
the United States. On the twenty -fifth day of 
the seventh moon the envoy Anson Burlingame, 
having arrived in Peking, presented your letter, 
which, when we had read it, we found to be 
written in a spirit of cordial friendliness [breath- 



98 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

ing] nothing but a desire for relations of amity 
that should ever increase in strength." ^ 

The notification to the foreign legations of the 
appointment of the envoy to the treaty powers 
was issued by Prince Kung on November 22. 
The copy sent to that of the United States reads 
as follows: 

Since the time when the treaties with foreign 
countries were ratified, the friendly relations between 
the two parties have daily strengthened. Every 
matter that has come up for discussion between the 
representatives of those nations now living at the 
capital and myself has been deliberated upon with 
so much sincerity and candour that they have in no 
case failed to be arranged to our mutual advantage. 
But all those countries are separated from this by 
wide oceans, and no envoy has hitherto been sent 
to those lands, and thus there has been no medium 
through whom the Chinese Government could per- 
sonally make known its views to their governments, 
or explain its policy. But now, seeing that his '■* 
excellency Anson Burlingame, lately the minister 
residing here from your honourable country, has such 
thorough acquaintance with the internal and ex- 
ternal relations of this country, and I myself have/ 
such entire confidence and acquaintance with him, 
it has seemed to be feasible for this government 
now to adopt the customs of those countries who 
have sent resident ministers to this, and it would, 
moreover, be exceedingly agreeable to me to com- 

^ Williams to Seward, December 23, 1867. ("Papers Relating to 
Foreign Affairs," 1869, part I, p. 496.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 99 

mission him as the envoy of his Imperial Majesty's 
Government to all the treaty powers, to attend to 
and manage whatever affairs may arise between 
them. I have already stated this matter in a memo- 
rial to the Throne, and yesterday I was honoured by 
receiving the following rescript: 

"The envoy Anson Burlingame manages affairs 
in a friendly and peaceful manner, and is fully ac- 
quainted with the general relations between this and 
other countries; let him, therefore, now be sent to 
all the treaty powers as the high minister, empowered 
to attend to every question arising between China 
and those countries. This from the Emperor." 

A copy of this rescript has been made known to 
Mr. Burlingame, and this copy has also now been 
made to communicate to your excellency for your 
information and action thereon.^ 

The credentials of the mission, as translated 
by its first secretary, J. McLeavy Brown, and 
approved by Messrs. Williams, Martin, and 

^ A few days later copies of the rescripts ordering the appointment of 
the Chinese envoys and of the secretaries were forwarded to the legations. 
Much was made afterward by the opponents of the Mission of the terms 
employed in these and the following documents. An erudite but de- 
mented German, Johannes von Gumpach, who had been relieved by 
Mr. Hart from his position as instructor in the imperial college, compiled 
in 1871 an extraordinary and vituperative volume of 891 pages, entitled 
"The Burlingame Mission: A Political Disclosure," which is supposed 
to have been financed by a number of British firms in Shanghai. The 
work was subsequently suppressed and is now rather rare. Dr. von 
Gumpach translated the rescript quoted above as follows: "The board 
for the general control of individual states' affairs, having respectfully 
submitted that the public messenger P'u-Ngan-Ch'en [Burlingame] 
transacts business matters in a conciliatory spirit, and is thoroughly 
conversant with the fundamental relations of the central [state] and the 
outer [states] : it is hereby ordered, that he be appointed to proceed to 
the individual states bound by treaty in the capacity of a high oflicial. 



100 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Hart — probably at the time the three foremost 
sinologues in Peking — are as follows : 

His Majesty the Emperor of China salutes . . . 
[the sovereign addressed]. 

In virtue of the commission we have with rever- 
ence received from Heaven, and as China and foreign 
nations are members of one family, we are cordially 
desirous of placing on a firm and lasting basis the 
relations of friendship and good understanding now 
existing between us and the nations at amity with 
China. And as a proof of our genuine desire for 
that object, we have specially selected an officer of 
worth, talents, and wisdom, Anson Burlingame, late 
minister at our capital for the United States of 
America, who is thoroughly conversant with Chinese 
and foreign relations, and in whom, in transacting 
all business in which the two empires [names given] 

to manage such matters as have arisen, in reference to each individual 
state, out of the [commercial] intercourse between the central [state] 
and the outer [states]. The rest according to prevision. This from 
the Emperor." 

Emphasis was laid chiefly upon the unwarrantable freedom of Mr. 
Williams's translation and on the derogatory terms employed for foreign 
countries and for envoy. There can be no question of the Emperor's 
claim of universal supremacy — still a tenet of Chinese orthodoxy — or 
of the conventional idea of "individual" states being inferior to the 
middle kingdom. But this and the title of "messenger" constituted a 
part of the time-honoured phraseology of Chinese diplomacy which the 
court could not venture to ignore without inviting a revolution on the 
part of the literati class of China. The California papers, for reasons 
of their own, evinced a very lively concern in the disparity between 
translations when the Chinese text was published, but the New York 
Tribune sensibly dismissed the difference as "less a matter of importance 
than of curiosity." Europeans might afford to treat such assumptions 
as good-naturedly as the Emperor Vespasian, who was content to reply 
to the Parthian's "Arsaces, King of Kings, to Flavins Vespasianus," — 
" Flavius Vespasianus to Arsaces, King of Kings, greeting." (Rawlinson 
"Sixth Great Oriental Monarchy," p. 290.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 101 

have a common interest, we have full confidence 
as our representative and the exponent of our ideas. 

We have also commissioned Chih Kang and Sun 
Chia Ku/ high oflScers with the honorary rank of 
the second grade, to accompany Mr. Burlingame to 
[name of capital], where Mr. Burlingame, with the 
two so appointed, will act as our high minister ex- 
traordinary and plenipotentiary. 

We have full confidence in the loyalty, zeal, and 
discretion of the said three ministers, and are as- 
sured they will discharge satisfactorily the duties 
intrusted to them, and we earnestly request that the 
fullest credence and trust may be accorded to them, 
and thereby our relations of friendship may be per- 
manent, and that both nations may enjoy the bless- 
ings of peace and tranquillity, a result which we are 
certain will be deeply gratifying. 

Dated this sixth day of the twelfth moon of the 
sixth year of our reign, Tung Chih. 

Mr. Williams's commentary upon this letter is 
of some value: 

The preparation and dispatch of these letters of 
credence marks an advance on the part of this gov- 
ernment almost as great as that of sending the Mis- 
sion itself, although apparently a mere consequence 
of that act. In order to explain this, it is needful 
to observe that the board of Foreign Office, notwith- 
standing its great influence and the high rank of its 
members, has hitherto no legal existence of itself, 
but at present consists of the presidents of four of 
the six boards, viz., civic office, revenue, punishments, 
and works, and two other high officers, who have 

1 Chih was born in Peking in 1819, Sun in Suchang in 1823. 



102 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

been detailed to join in its deliberations under the 
chairmanship of Prince Kung. The members act 
in it conjointly under the style of the Tsung-li koh 
kwoh s'z, or general managing office of foreign coun- 
tries; but individually they are responsible also for 
the conduct of their own departments to the general 
council of the government. When the desirableness 
of appointing Mr. Burlingame and his associates as 
envoys to foreign countries was proposed, the matter 
was agreed to by the Empress Regents and others, 
as a proposal of the Foreign Office chiefly, for the 
success and results of which it was responsible; but 
when the question of granting them a letter written 
directly from the Emperor to other crowned heads, 
indorsing the Mission and requesting them to accept 
it, the whole traditionary policy of the empire was 
interfered with; the supremacy of the Emperor as 
the Son of Heaven, appointed from on high to rule 
over mankind, was proposed to be practically ig- 
nored by his own officers. The propriety of grant- 
ing the letter was stoutly opposed by many of the 
members of government, and I am inclined to think 
that the Mission would have left the shores of China 
without it if it had not been for the precedent set 
by the Chinese Government itself, and drawn out 
of it by the American ministers. In explanation of 
this remark it may be stated that it has been the 
usage among most of the foreign ministers accredited 
to this government not to deliver their letters of cre- 
dence to the Emperor, because they were not per- 
mitted to do so in person ; but the American ministers 
have chosen to hand them to the highest official they 
could meet, accompanied by an open translation. 
Replies to two of these letters having been issued, 
it was argued by Mr. Brown and Mr. Hart (who. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 103 

being officials themselves, in the employ of govern- 
ment, were entitled to a hearing), that if his Majesty 
could personally reply to a letter from the President 
of the United States without derogating from his 
authority or dignity, he certainly could write a 
letter to him with equal propriety. The question 
had been often discussed whether it was suitable in 
every respect for the American minister to transmit 
his letter of credence to the Emperor instead of 
delivering it in person, but the result has answered 
a purpose that one cannot object to, and has prob- 
ably incidentally furnished a strong argument for 
those officers who, in a few years, must go further 
and claim for him an audience at court. 

I have read the translation of the letter addressed 
to the President, and I am confident that you will 
not find anything in it savouring of the extraordinary 
assumption on the part of the Emperor which runs 
through the two replies quoted in the other dispatch. 
It completes the full authority and authenticalness 
of this new Mission to the Western world on the 
part of this ancient empire, the first, I believe, which 
it ever sent from its shores to other lands on a footing 
even approaching to equality. Previous embassies 
have been sent in a patronising, authoritative style, 
requiring the rulers of other countries humbly to 
accept the envoys and behests of his Majesty; this 
goes to confirm and develop an intercourse mutually 
beneficial to all.^ 

As no written instructions were given their 
envoy, the following (December 7, 1867) from 
the Tsung-li Yamen to Mr. Williams — sub- 

^ Williams to Seward, January 25, 1868. 



104 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

stantially repeated in Prince Kung's communi- 
cation to the foreign ministers in Peking and to 
"the secretaries of state of those treaty powers 
not yet having diplomatic representatives in 
China" — claims attention as the sole author- 
isation for action abroad vouchsafed by the 
Imperial Government to its Embassy. 

His Imperial Majesty having seen fit to ap- 
point Anson Burlingame, formerly minister from the 
United States, with [the Manchu] Chih-Kang and 
[the Chinese] Sun Chia-ku, two of the members of 
the Foreign Office, to be his envoys to proceed to all 
the treaty powers with authority to manage what- 
ever affairs may arise between those countries and 
this, the imperial decrees conferring this authority 
on them were recently copied and sent to you. 

But I am somewhat apprehensive that the foreign 
ministers in this capital, learning that his Majesty 
has commissioned three persons at once thus to rep- 
resent him, will conclude that neither of them is to 
take the lead in conducting affairs with those nations, 
and I have therefore deemed it proper to explain the 
reasons of this cause in order to remove all doubt 
upon this point. 

It is the usage among all the great Western powers, 
in the interests of peace and goodwill, to appoint 
envoys to go to each other's countries to attend to 
any affairs that may arise; and it would have been 
proper, during the many years that peace has existed 
between your honourable country and this, for his 
Imperial Majesty to have, at a much earlier period, 
commissioned a high officer to go there for the pur- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 105 

pose of representing him and attending to any affairs 
arising between us. But owing to our imperfect 
knowledge of the languages and usages of foreign 
nations, this step has been delayed from time to 
time. Now, however, as Mr. Burlingame, a man of 1 
honour and peace, and intimately conversant with J 
our intercourse and relations with other countries 
— one, too, with whom the officers of this government 
have long had acquaintance and confidence — is 
willing to act on behalf of China in attending to her 
interests, a memorial was presented to his Majesty 
requesting that he might be appointed imperial 
commissioner to all the treaty powers, and that 
Messrs. Brown and Deschamps might be also ap- 
pointed to be first and second secretaries of the lega- 
tion, to aid him in conducting its duties and accom- 
plishing its purposes. But if no high officers are 
sent on the Mission from China also, there will here- 
after be no one sufficiently acquainted with the 
necessary details to be qualified to receive the post 
of envoy; and this consideration induced the Foreign 
Office again to request his Majesty to appoint both 
Chih and Sun as his imperial commissioners, to go at 
the same time. This arrangement would manifest 
the good feeling existing, and be, moreover, the means 
of giving them practice and experience in their 
duties. If they could, in this way, add to the effi- 
ciency and dignity of Mr. Burlingame and his two 
secretaries, then the completeness of the Mission for 
its duties would be all that could be desired. When 
this government at a future day desires to send her 
own envoys, she will then have precedents to fol- 
low, and it will be easier to prepare them for their 
duties. 

Everything, however, that relates to the duties 



106 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

of imperial commissioner in the United States will 
devolve alone on Mr. Burlingame, and his decision 
will be final; but the correspondence with the 
Foreign Office at Peking will properly devolve upon 
the two Chinese commissioners, who will at all 
times consult with Mr. Burlingame in attending to 
their duties. In this way the requirements of the 
entire legation will be provided for without difficulty 
to any part of it. As one of its members under-7 
stands the languages and peculiarities of all the 
countries he will visit, so do the other two as fully 
comprehend the language and affairs of China. 
This arrangement is, however, rather a temporary 
one, applicable at the initiation of the Mission, and 
is not designed to serve as a constant rule in the 
future. I have, therefore, to request that you will 
inform the secretary of state of these particulars, 
so that when these imperial commissioners reach 
the United States to transact the business of their 
Mission, he will be fully aware of their position and 
relative duties. 

Evidences of dissatisfaction over the concep- 
tion of an Embassy to the Western powers were 
numerous and immediate on the part of the 
conservative politicians in Peking. They would 
have been more numerous had the court been 
less prompt in its action. As it was, the coun- 
try was not taken into its confidence in this 
matter, the reason obviously being that to call 
for counsel upon such an unprecedented propo- 
sition in the presence of the universal rancour 
of the literary aristocracy against the "bar- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 107 

barians" was to invite antagonism. The sin- 
cerity of the Prince and his confreres in pushing 
their project is amply testified by their plain 
intention of thus forestalling criticism. Such 
criticism was far more general than foreigners 
at the time were aware of, and in the absence of 
a native press only a few specimens came into 
their hands. One of these will suffice as an 
expression of a malignant feeling that was wide- 
spread. 

Wo-jen, the grand secretary of the imperial 
library and senior tutor to the Emperor, had 
become the chief spokesman of the anti-foreign 
national party by reason of two diatribes which 
he had issued in 1867 against the establishment 
of the college in Peking for educating Chinese 
in European languages and science. The at- 
tempt had been made to neutralise his opposi- 
tion by appointing him to the Tsung-li Yamen, 
and thus render him directly responsible for all 
those concessions that were inevitable in deal- 
ing with this irreducible group of outsiders, but 
Wo was too crafty and too firmly supported by 
influential backers to be easily checkmated. He 
never attended the board — a flagrant act of 
contumacy — but was subsequently allowed to 
withdraw on account of ill health. His memo- 
rial upon the Mission deserves attention, both 



108 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

on account of liis position and because it sums 
up the chief objections urged by his partisans 
against this innovation. Categorically stated, 
these were five in number, viz. : (1) There could 
be no "amicable relations" — quoting the offen- 
sive expression used in the Yamen's petition — 
with the barbarians until their invasion of China 
and the exile of his late Majesty were avenged 
and "the hatred of the common people fulfilled.'* 
(2) Pin's mission was not of a kind to serve as 
precedent for such an embassy as was now con- 
templated, while bestowing the rank of imperial 
envoy^ upon its chief was "an excessive com- 
pliment" to Americans. (3) The appointment 
of American, British, and French subjects was 
putting power into the hands of foreigners, but 
"still more astounding is the notion of Chinese 
functionaries in a subordinate position; it is 
tantamount to acknowledging ourselves a sub- 
ject state and ignoring the dignity of the empire." 

(4) As to observing the customs of foreigners and 
learning from them — "their customs are noth- 
ing but lasciviousness and cunning, while their 
inclinations are simply fiendish and malignant." 

(5) Finally, "as regards the benefit of treaty 
revision, the Yamen do not see that any such 

^ Precisely the rank and title, by the way, that was objected to by 
foreign critics of the Mission as insulting the dignity of a self-respecting 
European in Chinese employ. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 109 

benefit is entirely on the side of the barbarians 
while the disadvantages all accrue to the Chi- 
nese. Who will assert that the barbarians are 
willing to make advantageous concessions to the 
Chinese?" As a last argument the memor- 
ialist expresses some characteristic apprehension 
upon the important item of travelling expenses, 
"which are exorbitant and profuse beyond any- 
thing known in China. The accounts," he adds 
significantly, "will be in the hands of the bar- 
barians, and it will be next to impossible to 
check falsification." ^ 

The first Chinese Mission to foreign powers 
was dispatched by Prince Kung and his coad- 
jutors because they were aware of the appalling 
hazard of the upper and the nether millstones 
that threatened to grind the Manchu dynasty to 
powder. The distress and disasters associated 
with the reigns of its decadent sovereigns were 
attributed by their subjects to the incompetent 
autocrat and his advisers. The history of China 
has ever shown the course of action to the 
people when admonitions fail and the misman- 
agement of their rulers passes endurance. For, 
as the common man is responsible to his ruler, 
so is the ruler responsible for the prosperity of 

^ The memorial is reprinted in the North China Herald, and discussed 
at some length in the paper entitled "Chinese Statesmen and State 
Papers," I, Fortnightly Review, March, 1871. 



110 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

his realm to heaven. Every calamity in the 
country, whether it be famine or pestilence or 
a foreign foe, is laid at the door of the Emperor, 
and the instrument of Heaven's punishment, the 
means of redress, is rebellion. 

This was the nether millstone; the upper was 
the foreigner — ruthless and pervading, armed 
with magical arts and valiant in the certainty 
of his destructive puissance. For while the cul- 
ture of the barbarians had made little impres- 
sion upon educated natives, their powers of 
mischief seemed hardly short of supernatural. 
Thoughtful men were terrified, yet unconvinced. 
Foreigners had domineered over the coast towns 
for ten years since the Arrow War, and their 
merchants were now urging further aggressions; 
the crisis demanded prompt action. A few bold 
fighters, like Tseng Kwo-fan and Tso Tsung- 
tang, advised the creation of an army of defence. 
But this would require years; the statesmen in 
Peking knew, moreover, that the fighting spirit 
had departed from the Manchu, and that China 
was, for the moment at least, too unwarlike to 
make such a policy feasible. With the same K 
audacity that prompted the Empress-Dowager 
to enlist the demoniacal mummery of the Boxers 
to save the situation in 1900, the Tsung-li offi- 
cials — though better informed and with greater 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 111 

judgment — turned to their best friend among 
the foreigners to help China in the emergency, 
by appeahng directly to the courts of Western 
nations to be patient and give her time. 

We have seen the steps by which their chosen 
ambassador had won his way to their regard 
and impressed them with his extraordinary per- 
sonal charm. We are to-day probably far better 
aware of some of the motives which impelled 
them than that ambassador was himself. We 
know now better than any foreigner of that 
time the risks they took with the vast majority 
of their own countrymen in appointing him. 
We know, too, that they were even divided 
amongst themselves. Had they been less ap- 
prehensive of another war, they might not have 
yielded a measure so largely stimulated by their 
fears; had Mr. Burlingame, on the other hand, 
known more fully the supineness of the palace 
and the aggressiveness of the recalcitrants, he 
might have refused to attempt the seemingly 
hopeless task of representing a government • .y* 
divided against itself. But he had faith in r 
China, and no one was ever more completely 
imbued with the courage of his convictions. 
He perceived, if only imperfectly, the political 
distress of the empire; he saw the disastrous 
outcome, not only to China but to the civilised 



112 ANSON BURLINGAME 

world, if the nations of Europe were to fall upon 
her once more and destroy the reigning dynasty. 
Convinced that he was right, he volunteered his 
service to a great state that no one in authority 
was willing to befriend, because he was, in the 
words of Prince Kung, "a man of honour and 
peace." 



THE MISSION IN AMERICA 

DURING the voyage of thirty days across 
the Pacific to CaKf ornia, Mr. Burhngame 
enjoyed abundant opportunity for dis- 
cussing with his associates the problems of the 
Mission and of resolving the policy likely to 
bring them to a successful issue. There is, so 
far as is known, no minute of his own upon this 
supreme affair of his life. He pondered deeply; 
he discussed freely with those who could aid 
with their experience or suggestions; he did not 
write. Discussion with him was a means of 
clearing the mind and of approaching conclu- 
sions. He had little patience for inditing letters 
and none at all for that laborious relegation 
of thoughts and impressions to note-books or 
diaries which characterises some men of action,^ 
He had been charged to exercise his discretion 
in representing the case of China before the 
civilised world, but, as we have seen, he had 
received no instructions directing or limiting 
him in the execution of this large order. The 

* " Writing was labour and weariness to him," says Senator Blaine. 
"It seemed impossible for him to establish a rapid transit between his 
brain and the end of a pen." (" Mr. Burlingame as an Orator," Atlantic 
Monthly, November, 1870.) 

113 



114 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Chinese commissioned with him were present in 
the role of "learners" rather than as coadjutors; 
from them nothing was to be expected except 
the service of communicating with their gov- 
ernment. It speaks well for the dignity of that 
government and for the regard in which the 
members of his suite held him, that no criticism 
of his policy seems to have either come from 
Peking or reached the Tsung-li Yamen through 
the private correspondence of any one of them. 
No diplomatic venture of similar importance in 
modern times has left so meagre a record of 
authentic documents or been aspersed by its 
detractors with a slighter basis of proofs upon 
which to establish their objections. It is the 
absence of documentary material that makes it 
difficult to meet these aspersions by the cate- 
gorical denial which is fairly justified by every 
reasonable inference from known facts. 

Such measure of success and failure as re- 
sulted from this experimental embassy was due 
to the temperament of its chief, who was at 
once its origin and conclusion. His gracious- 
ness and his fine assurance of better things pre- 
vailing not only made converts to his ideas 
wherever he went but conveyed a conviction of 
ysincerity. There are few public careers in re- 
cent history which exhibit such powers of win- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 115 

ning the minds of others. Some such quahty 
as his is found at rare intervals among great re- 
ligious leaders, the force of whose appeal rests 
upon its divine sanction. The Methodist prayer- 
leader's son had developed in the school of 
politics a gift of persuasion like that which his 
father had employed in another sphere, and the 
same idealism marked them both. It is a 
faculty that always Avins its audience; but fifty 
years ago men cared for their intuitions rather 
than for academic learning, and responded to 
their preachers and orators rather than to logic. 
In the case of Mr. Burlingame — where there 
was no pretence, of course, of spiritual dignifi- 
cation — this magnetic quality of converting to 
his own opinion those before whom he stood 
face to face rose to something higher than the 
art of the orator; it was an emanation of genius. 
It is not surprising that a character of this sort 
should be often misunderstood or that the en- 
emies of his great idea should take advantage 
of its apparently illogical processes. Its success 
in prosecuting a plan depended upon personal 
contact, and it had the inevitable drawback 
that when that personal contact was removed 
further accomplishment lagged or became im- 
possible. By keeping in mind the elements of 
what we nowadays call the "personal equation," 



116 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

it will be easier to comprehend how the ideals 
of its advocate stirred the minds of those to 
whom this Mission was presented, and why, 
when his voice was stilled, the generous impulses 
of Western nations were smothered by the out- 
cry from many whose selfish interests the reali- 
sation of these ideals seemed to threaten. 

Mr. Burlingame was not unaware of some hos- 
tility to his Mission. He could meet opposition, 
but he was sensitive to criticisms which endeav- 
oured to discredit his enterprise by imputing 
unworthy personal motives. In a sketch of his 
career, printed in "Appleton's Annual Cyclo- 
pedia" for 1870, an old acquaintance describes 
in the following anecdote the state of his mind 
upon arriving in America in an unprecedented 
role: "Just before he left the shores of Asia he 
saw a newspaper which bitterly denounced him 
for renouncing his American allegiance, as it 
charged, to take a lucrative appointment from 
a foreign power. In the weeks of his long jour- 
ney across the Pacific, it often oppressed him 
with gloomy forebodings. Before he reached 
the Golden Gate they became at times almost 
unendurable. 'Is it not possible,' he reasoned 
to himself, *that Americans may regard my 
acceptance of this foreign trust as a selling out 
of my birthright?' He knew he had been con- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 117 

sclentlous in consenting to take it, in the inter- 
est of civilisation, humanity, progress, and in- 
ternational goodwill. But he knew, too, how 
harshly and unjustly public men are sometimes 
judged; and when the steamer sailed up to the 
wharf at San Francisco he was in a state of 
feverish excitement. The wharf was densely 
crowded. He looked from the deck of the 
steamer upon them, and w^ondered if it were 
possible that, inflamed by hostile criticism, they 
had come down there to jeer and insult him. 
The first man who came upon the deck before 
the steamer had swung round to its place was 
a porter, or baggage-man, who, of course, did 
not know him. Burlingame asked him, as coolly 
as possible, what all this crowd meant. * Why,' 
answered the man, * the whole city is here to 
welcome the new Chinese minister, and the city 
authorities to proffer him its hospitalities.' 
The suspense was over, and his heart never 
throbbed a sincerer Thank God ! " 

From the moment of this impromptu welcome 
in April the progress of the Mission throughout 
the United States was a continual ovation until 
its departure in November. Such manifesta- 
tions of cordiality as greeted its appearance 
everywhere were obviously the good-natured 
exuberance of people who were gratified at a 



^tfl^y 



118 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

novel spectacle and pleased with the alluring 
commercial possibilities suggested. The spectre 
of a yellow peril had not yet harassed the Ameri- 
can imagination nor had fears of undesirable emi- 
grants disturbed its dreams of the future. To a 
man of his vision Mr. Burlingame's reception by 
his countrymen seemed to be the vindication of 
his idea. As a missionary of goodwill to all na- 
tions he spoke with ardour of the seemliness of 
reversing the old policy of belligerent pressure 
and winning China by patience and conciliation; 
and all to whom he spoke were persuaded of the 
justice of his appeal. It was pleasant to turn 
from the sore stress of reconstruction after a 
long civil war, and the profitless polemic of a 
presidential impeachment, to this plea for an 
unoffending people. Freed from misgivings as 
well as from animadversion, and conscious of 
the real nobility of his cause, the advocate of a 
great though disordered state was aware of no 
exaggeration when he promised a quickening of 
its life which, in the nature of things, could only 
be accomplished in its own way and in the dis- 
tant future. It happened, unfortunately, that 
his ready success with his audiences in America 
was partly due to their entire ignorance of con- 
ditions across the Pacific, and the consequent 
lack of any considerable body of men whose 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 119 

business experience with the East could divide 
in the interest of accuracy the orator's figures of 
speech by the figures upon their trade ledgers. 
Had the course of the Mission in the United 
States been attended by an intelligent and de- 
termined opposition on the part of an enlight- 
ened group who were aware of China's tenacious 
conservatism, the reaction that followed would 
have been less severe/ 

In both the time and place of its arrival in 
America the Mission achieved a succes d'estime. 
The country was ready, through weariness with 
its own disorders, to welcome any safe distrac- 
tion, and here was a novelty that appealed both 
to the imagination and to the pride of the 
American people. What was true of the whole 
population was particularly applicable to that 
portion whose location on the Pacific entitled 
them, in their own minds at least, to a certain 
priority of interest in China. In the newest and 

1 An editorial in the New York Times of June 7, 1868, among the first 
to deplore the introduction of Chinese labourers in America, exhibits 
well enough the ignorance of Chinese politics among professional pub- 
licists in this country. " The new policy," it declares, " which the Chinese 
empire has inaugurated is unquestionably due to the existence of a 
greater population within the limits of the empire than it can support. 
The fact that it has reached this condition was proved by the willingness 
of the government to encourage immigration to California." Of course 
we know now that the government at that time would willingly have 
punished every Chinese who broke the law of the empire by leaving 
that country, but was helpless to prevent the European agencies who 
were enticing them away to virtual slavery in Cuba, South America, and 
elsewhere. 



no ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

finest hotel on the continent, the citizens of San 
Francisco, with the governor of the State at 
their head, gave the Mission an "ovation" that/ 
was neither without form nor void of those hvely 
hopes for profitable intercourse which stimulate 
most international courtesies. The splendour of 
the demonstration produced its effect upon the 
Chinese guests, but to their chief, who was 
toasted as "the son of the youngest and repre- 
sentative of the oldest government," it appealed 
profoundly, touching his imagination with the 
magic of a great augury as he rose to reply. 
"The true gift of every emancipating enthu- 
siasm," says a recent writer,^ "is not solely the 
emancipation, but the enthusiasm; is not liberty 
in its formal estate, to be selfishly enjoyed, but 
that liberty of spirit which sees its own issues 
and leaps to espouse its own causes under all 
the forms, wherever found, of negation and re- 
pression." He saw a glorious future for China, 
when she should achieve, perhaps centuries 
hence, that emancipation from obstinate bigotry 
which alone shackled the freedom of her spirit. 
He declared his belief in her honest intention to 
enter the brotherhood of nations, and pleaded 
for patience from those who were in danger of 
misjudging her, as well as for a generous con- 

1 H. Dyer, "Japan in World Politics," 1909, p. 88. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 121 

struction of the energetic language he was fain 
to use. He announced his own behef that the 
dispatch of the Mission was due to the impres- 
sion made upon Chinese statesmen of the co- 
operative pohcy and their new-found under- 
standing of the advantages of the principles of 
international law. The Mission, he declared, 

means commerce; it means peace; it means a uni- 
fication of her own interests with the whole human 
race. I agree with you, sir, here to-night that this 
is one of the mightiest movements of modern times; 
and although this ephemeral Mission may soon pass 
away, that great movement must go on. The great 
deed is done. The fraternal feeling of four hundred 
millions of people has commenced to flow through 
the land of Washington to the elder nations of the 
West, and it will flow on forever. Who is there who 
would check it.^* Who is there that would say to 
China: We wish to have no other relations with you 
than such as we established in our own partial and 
cruel interests at the cannon's mouth. I trust there 
are none such as these. I believe, rather, that this 
generous greeting is a better exponent of the wishes 
of the West. I believe it represents more truly that 
large and generous spirit which is not too proud to 
learn and which is not afraid to teach; that great 
spirit which, while it would exchange goods with 
China, would also exchange thoughts with China; 
that would inquire carefully into the cause of that 
sobriety and industry of which you have made men- 
tion; that would learn something of the long expe- 
rience of this people; that would question those 
institutions which have withstood the storms of 



122 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

time — as to the secret of their stabihty; that would 
ask what means that competitive system under which 
the lowest coolie's son may rise to the highest office 
in the empire, and which makes scholarship the test 
of merit; that does not believe that genius is dead 
in the land of Confucius; that does not believe that 
the mind may no more be kindled that invented 
gunpowder, the compass, porcelain, paper, and print- 
ing; that does not believe that the Christian's hope 
shall cease to bloom where the Christian martyrs 
fell. 

"If there ever was a country," wrote Emerson, 
"where eloquence was a power it is in the United 
States. Here is room for every degree of it on 
every one of its ascending scales." Yet where 
oratory is accepted as a power its language re- 
quires and usually receives the deduction due 
to any well-developed form of artistic expression; 
like other arts, the forensic has its conventions 
and demands their interpretation while convey- 
ing its message. The orator, especially on festal 
occasions, speaks primarily to his audience and 
prepares his speech in terms designed to con- 
vince those who sit before him. Mr. Burlin- 
game's response, inspired by the hope of a com- 
ing sodality between nations hitherto hardly 
conscious of each other's existence, was ad- 
dressed to a company who, having no traditions 
of a communal past, lived with their faces turned 
toward the future. It happened a few years 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 123 

later that poignant fears of being supplanted in 
their mines and industries by Chinese labourers 
brought them into antagonism with the very 
plans and prospects which they here acclaimed, y 
and in the sudden reversal of opinion Mr. Bur- 
lingame's reputation shared the odium of his 
cause. But it is difficult to understand how any 
caution of language on his part could have saved 
him from a fate common to the emissaries of all 
novel enterprises. Reactions are inevitable be- 
fore society can adjust itself to new principles; 
he had to suffer under a universal law, not only 
at the hands of his countrymen, but abroad. 
When this address to Californians reached the 
ears of foreigners unaware of the envoy's im- 
pressionable audience, they called his language 
fantastic, and derided his promise of ,a reconsti- 
tuted China because they saw no prospect of 
its immediate fulfilment. So his audience under- 
stood and then forgot, while the Europeans 
never understood at all. 

His effort ^ was confronted, indeed, with a 
dilemma which no genius could have foreseen 
or avoided. Had it not been cordially greeted 
by Americans the Mission would have been pro- 
nounced a failure and the Chinese who pro- 

^ Henri Cordier calls it "le plus brillant, mais aussi le plus declamatoire 
et le plus creux des discours qu'il improvisa au cours de ses peregrina- 
tions." ("Histoire des relations de la Chine," I, 1901, p. 289.) 



IM ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

moted it humiliated; as it was, the unusual 
acclaim in California and the intrepid optimism 
of its chief awakened ill-will in Europe, besides 
irritating those foreigners in the East who dis- 
couraged hopefulness about China's political re- 
establishment and much preferred the mainten- 
ance of foreign prestige supported by war-ships.^ 
As a plenipotentiary aware of the sympathy of 
the American Government with the objects of 
his Mission, it was his duty to make plain these 
objects to his own countrymen and to culti- 
vate a sentiment of friendliness in behalf of 
the nation whose cause he was promoting. It 
cannot properly be said that he misjudged in 
endeavouring to secure for the representatives 
of China a cordial reception in the land of his 
birth. He was aware of the jealousy of Euro- 
peans over his appointment, but their objection 
to seeing an American mediator between China 
and the West was best met by making it evident 

1 The attitude of foreign merchants in China is fairly shown in the 
declaration of the China Mail, "that progress is unattainable save under 
continuous pressure, and that the exercise of such pressure with judicial 
and equitable firmness is the indispensable condition upon which not 
alone progress but the maintenance of existing rights depends for all 
foreigners in China." (Hongkong, July 30, 1869.) Of these same mer- 
chants Sir R. Alcock wrote that "they have too plainly shown that they 
have no regard or consideration for either the rights or the interests of 
others; and the Chinese have a perfectly clear conception that the coun- 
try has both sovereign and national interests which it is their business 
to uphold, whatever foreigners may think or say to the contrary." 
(Alcock to Lord Stanley, April 16, 1868.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 125 

that his selection by the Chinese Government 
was chiefly due to his personal qualities. This 
was perfectly true. There is to this day little 
variation in the degree of Chinese dislike of all 
foreign nations; there was none then. It was 
not a matter that could be formulated without 
an unpleasant implication of egotism, yet if the 
actual truth might transpire from observation 
of his conduct it relieved America from a sus- 
picion of attempting to champion the cause of 
China against the world, and China from the 
charge of avoiding in this way her ow^n respon- 
sibilities.^ 

While this was the case the dilemma, never- 
theless, remained. However creditable and sin- 
cere his efforts to insure the success of his Mis- 
sion, it was impossible to escape the inevitable 
outburst of disappointed hopes cherished by 
those who anticipated in this Mission a new 
instrument for exploiting China at the expense 
of the Chinese. The explosion came when his 
published utterances in America disclosed his 

^ The Shanghai correspondent of the London Times (February 12, 1868) 
writes: "Cosmopolitan community as we are, we were not sufficiently 
so at heart to look complacently on the nomination of an American 
mediator between China and the West. This feeling, however, not an 
unnatural one, perhaps, at the first blush, has greatly subsided on reflec- 
tion. I fail myself to see any fair ground for jealousy." He concludes 
his letter with the assertion that "it is the individual rather than the 
national who has been selected — Mr. Burlingame rather than the 
United States minister." 



126 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

loyalty to his principles and to the nation whose 
cause he advocated. As a man of honour he 
admitted no double role; as a lawyer he recog- 
nised his first obligation to be his client's interest 
— with but one explicit reservation that pro- 
vided for unswerving allegiance to his own coun- 
try. And the complaint of Europeans in China 
that the success of the Mission had "spoiled the 
^ game" was justified in one important sense: it 
gave fresh courage to the Chinese who identi- 
fied their patriotism with a strong personal dis- 
like of foreigners. These had long nursed their 
antipathy upon acts of interference with the 
internal administration of their country which 
they were powerless to prevent. They fondly 
imagined that the champion who was proclaim- 
ing in the West that China had a few officials in 
responsible positions who were capable of form- 
ing rational views and advising a reasonably pro- 
gressive policy would raise up friends to defend 
their reactionary antagonism. In their igno- 
rance they brought fresh pressure to bear upon 
their ministers who were engaged with Sir 
Rutherford Alcock in revising the British treaty, 
and ultimately prevented them from granting 
A the more substantial privileges which — among 
foreigners at least — they were expected to yield 
through this negotiation. From the stand-point 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 127 

of Chinese cliauvinism the Mission was a decided 
if unlooked-for success; but no man could serve 
the God and the mammon of these two opposing 
races. 

Upon reaching Washington the Embassy was 
installed in Brown's Hotel on Pennsylvania 
Avenue, where the great yellow flag bearing the 
imperial dragon floating over the roof attracted 
more attention than had ever before been given 
to the coming of new envoys to the capital. It 
was remarked, rather naively, at the time that 
the Chinese representatives were men of breed- 
ing and intellect — a suggestive commentary 
upon American acquaintance with the history 
and culture of this ancient empire.^ Mr. Bur- 
lingame immediately after his arrival called at 
Mr. Seward's house for the personal interview 
he had requested in his letter from Shanghai. 
He was relieved, on consulting his old associate 
of congressional days, of any remaining com- 
punctions as to his status as an American citizen 
by finding that the secretary's opinion upon this 
point agreed with his own. As legislation had 
not then determined points of foreign service 

1 "Whether in the public assembly or the fashionable soiree or in the 
domestic circle, they were everywhere at ease. Their gracefulness of 
manner, their unpretending and cordial politeness, their ready wit and 
pleasantry were subjects of general remark." (W. L. Neviu^ "China 
and the Chinese," 1869, p. 440.) 



128 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

and expatriation the question was a more serious 
one than it would be now. A matter of more 
vital consequence was the envoy's presentation 
at the White House. The Emperor of China 
had refused to grant audience to the American 
minister at Peking on terms of equality, and did 
not demand it in this instance from the Presi- 
dent. But in this most democratic of the cap- 
itals of Christendom, where the privilege was 
accorded to visitors of all ranks, to exclude the 
Chinese legation was to weaken its prestige in 
the popular esteem. Both the envoy and the 
secretary of state were glad to escape the diffi- 
culty by agreeing upon the following draft of a 
reply from the department to a request for a 
reception by the President: 

It is well understood by this government that, 
owing to the minority of the Emperor of China, the 
sovereign authority of the empire is now exercised 
by a regency. Reserving, therefore, and waiving, 
though only during the Emperor's minority, the 
question concerning the privileges of personal audi- 
ence by the head of the Chinese Government, the 
President of the United States will cheerfully receive 
their excellencies the high ministers of China, on 
Friday, at twelve o'clock at noon, at the executive 
mansion. 

They were received on the appointed day, 
June 6, with the customary ceremonies and 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 129 

with sincere cordiality by President Johnson in 
the White House, when Mr. BurHngame ex- 
pressed his appreciation of the manner in which 
his change of representative character had "been 
allowed by the American people . " He announced 
the intention of the Chinese Government to 
enter into communication in conformity with 
established diplomatic usages with the United 
States of America and ten states of Europe — 
Austro-Hungary and Portugal being the only 
ones of consequence omitted. " We are charged," 
he concluded, in delivering the Emperor's letter, 

at the expense of what might bear the appearance of 
egotism, to say that there are nine official ranks in 
China. By way of showing the greatest possible 
respect to the Western powers, the letters to which I 
refer were committed to the care of myself, of the 
first rank, and to Chih Ta-jen and Sun Ta-jen, of 
the second rank, myself being invested with extraor- 
dinary and plenipotentiary functions, and all of us 
being accredited to you as high ministers and envoys. 

The President's reply was rather more elab- 
orate and discursive than usual upon such occa- 
sions. He alluded warily to the way in which 
the United States had been treated by other 
nations in the past, and to the improvement in 
their foreign relations within a few years, ex- 
tending friendly intercourse to Greece, the Otto- 
man Porte, and Japan. The touch of patronage 



130 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

— inevitable, apparently, when Western nations 
address Orientals — is as delicate as could be 
expected: "China, having accepted the laws of 
nations as they are explained in our own ap- 
proved compilation, now avails herself, through 
your Mission, of our friendly introduction to 
the Christian states of Europe and America. 
These events reveal the pleasing fact of a rapid 
growth of mutual trust and confidence among 
the nations resulting from a general suspension 
of the policy of war and conquest and a sub- 
stitution of a fraternal and benevolent policy in 
its place. Your excellencies, we have not failed 
to appreciate the sagacity with which the Chinese 
Empire has responded to this change of policy 
by the Christian nations." ^ The irony of his- 
tory has seldom received more emphatic illustra- 
tion than by these diplomatic platitudes as read 
in the light of the warhke events which cloud 
the last four decades of the nineteenth century. 
A state dinner was given to the envoys by the 
President in the White House, and the represent- 

1 Mr. Frederick W. Seward, in his biography of his father, says that 
while presidents, like other heads of states, have their formal speeches 
prepared for them, Johnson was a most painstaking and scrupulous 
student of expression, and never liked to accept or sign documents with- 
out making changes of his own. Usually when a foreign minister had 
been presented and read his formal speech, the President would wave 
his hand toward Seward, saying, "The secretary of state will read the 
. speech in reply." We must infer that this exordium of some nine hun- 
dred words addressed to the Chinese envoys was his own composition. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 131 

atlves in Congress subsequently received them 
on the floor of the House with an address by the 
speaker, Schuyler Colfax, a noteworthy wel- 
come in the name of the people of the United 
States. His compliment to Mr. Burlingame 
was most appropriately worded for the place in 
which he spoke: "Nor does it lessen our pleas- 
ure that the chief of this Embassy, transferred, 
as he was, from membership here to diplomatic 
duties abroad, so won the confidence of his 
Imperial Majesty, to whom he was accredited, 
that he returns to our midst, honoured, with his 
distinguished associates, as custodians of the 
most remarkable trust ever committed by an 
emperor to his envoys." Replying in behalf of 
his coadjutors from the floor on which he had 
often in times past addressed his fellow-members, 
Mr. Burlingame assured his countrymen that 

We seek for China that equality without which 
nations and men are degraded. We seek not only 
the good of China, but we seek your good and the 
good of all mankind. We do this in no sentimental 
sense. We would be practical as the toiling millions 
whom we represent. We invite you to a broader 
trade. We invite you to a more intimate examina- 
tion of the structure of Chinese civilisation. We in- 
vite you to a better appreciation of the manners of 
that people, their temperance, their patience, their 
habits of scholarship, their competitive examinations, 
their high culture of tea and silk; and we shall ask 



132 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

for them, from you, modern science, which has taken 
its great development within the memory of man, 
and the holy doctrines of our Christian faith. It is 
for the West to say whether or not it was sincere 
when it continued for a long time to invite China 
to more intimate relations with it. It is for the 
West to say whether it is for a fair and open pol- 
icy, or for one founded on prejudice and on that as- 
sumption of superiority which is justified neither by 
physical ability nor by moral elevation.^ 

It is not surprising that under the quite ex- 
traordinary circumstances of this reception their 
inspiration should have influenced his reply. 
They prompted his magnanimous nature to re- 
spond heartily to the kindly things that were 
said to him, and to promise rather liberally, in 

^ The following extract from a letter written by a Western congressman 
to a friend in San Francisco has an interest all its own both for its sub- 
ject and style: "A few days ago Burlingame and the Chinese were pre- 
sented. It was a singular sight to see that ancient Asiatic countenance, 
lighted by the conceit and shaded by the tyrannies of 4,000 years, led by 
the smooth-faced Anglo-Saxon, beneath the shadow of the Eagle and 
Stars, to receive the welcome of men whose creed it is to hate idolatry 
and despotism, and whose only ineradicable custom it is to despise caste 
and ceremony and stability (sic). What a grand spectacle to witness 
the four hundred millions of Chinamen, as it were, stopping in the long 
tide of centuries, resting on their oars and catching across the ocean the 
sounds of republican America, the hum of their machinery, the scream 
of their whistles, the roar of their trains, and all the multitudinous 
voices of progress so familiar to us. They have heard of our greatness 
and our invincible power, and now lean forward to catch on the breezes 
of their East the faint sounds of a civilisation they feel to be the master 
of their own. You at San Francisco will be the first to be benefited by 
this great awakening. And your city, if the present is an augury of the 
future, will be a rival of New York and London as a commercial em- 
porium." (Quoted in the San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin, July 31, 
1868.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 133 

return, future benefits that were not his to be- 
stow. So it happened that in the fulness of his 
heart he gave expression to hopes which were in 
themselves not unjustifiable, but which a less 
emotional speaker might have thought best to 
leave unspoken, only because they were remote. 
Here as elsewhere in America he trusted his 
countrymen to make the proper subtraction. 
Before more impassive auditors in Europe, where 
his cause had to be won against those who would 
have been glad to antagonise his Mission, he laid 
himself open to no just criticism of this sort, 
but prosecuted his task by the exercise of the 
highest powers of argument and diplomatic per- 
suasion. Yet, while it is true that he had no 
immediate warrant from China to ask in her 
behalf for modern science and "the holy doc- 
trines of our Christian faith" — whatever the 
prospect for change of attitude in the coming 
years — this might properly have been dismissed 
as the amiable desire of a Western spokesman 
whose assurance included future generations. 
The important point of his response lay in his 
plea for an honest application to China of those 
Christian principles which have so often been 
traduced by that "assumption of superiority 
which is justified neither by physical ability 
nor moral elevation." 



134 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

The same appeal inspired a more famous 
speech made at a banquet given to the Mission 
on June 23d by the leading citizens of New 
York, with the governor in the chair. To this 
company of merchants and men of affairs, 
whose chief interest in the Embassy was con- 
fessedly the material hope of a lucrative com- 
merce with a populous empire soon to be brought 
to their doors by the new Pacific railroad, the 
orator renewed the plea to grant China fair play 
and leave her time to develop in peace. 

You have given a broad and generous welcome to a 
movement made in the interests of all mankind. We 
are but the humble heralds of the movement. It 
originated beyond the boundaries of our own thoughts 
and has taken dimensions beyond the reach of our 
most ardent hopes. That East, which men have 
sought since the days of Alexander, now itself seeks 
the West. China, emerging from the mists of time, 
but yesterday suddenly entered your Western gates, 
and confronts you by its representatives here to-night. 
What have you to say to her.'* She comes with no 
menace on her lips. She comes with the great doc- 
trine of Confucius, uttered two thousand three hun- 
dred years ago, "Do not unto others what you would 
not have others do unto you." Will you not respond 
with the more positive doctrine of Christianity, " We 
will do unto others what we would have others do 
unto us".'^ She comes with your own international 
law; she tells you that she is willing to come into 
relations according to it, that she is willing to abide 
by its provisions, that she is willing to take its ob- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 135 

ligations for its privileges. She asks you to forget 
your ancient prejudices, to abandon your assump- 
tions of superiority, and to submit your questions 
with her, as she proposes to submit her questions 
with you — to the arbitrament of reason. She 
mshes no war; she asks of you not to interfere in 
her internal affairs. She asks you not to send her 
lecturers who are incompetent men. She asks you 
that you will respect the neutrality of her waters 
and the integrity of her territory. She asks, in a 
word, to be left perfectly free to unfold herself pre- 
cisely in that form of civilisation of which she is 
most capable. She asks you to give to those treaties y 
which were made under the pressure of war a gen->A 
erous and Christian construction. Because you have 
done this, because the Western nations have reversed 
their old doctrine of force, she responds, and, in 
proportion as you have expressed your goodwill, 
she has come forth to meet you; and I aver, that 
there is no spot on earth where there has been greater 
progress made within the past few years than in the 
Empire of China. She has expanded her trade, she ly 
has reformed her revenue sj^stem, she is changing 
her military and naval organisations, she has built 
or established a great school where modern science 
and the foreign languages are to be taught. She 
has done this under every adverse circumstance. 
She has done this after a great war lasting through 
thirteen years, a war out of which she comes with no 
national debt. You must remember how dense is 
her population. You must remember how difficult 
it is to introduce radical changes in such a country 
as that. The introduction of your own steamers 
threw out of employment a hundred thousand junk- 
men. The introduction of several hundred foreign- 






136 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

ers into the civil service embittered, of course, the 
ancient native employees. The establishment of a 
school was formidably resisted by a party led by 
one of the greatest men of the empire. Yet, in de- 
fiance of all these, the present enlightened Govern- 
ment of China has advanced steadily along the path 
of progress, sustained, it is true, by the enlightened 
representatives of the Western powers now at Pe- 
king, guided and directed largely by a modest and 
able man, Mr. Hart, the inspector-general of cus- 
toms, at the head of the foreign employees in the 
Empire of China. . . . Yet, notwithstanding this 
manifest progress, there are people who will tell you 
that China has made no progress, that her views are 
retrograde; and they tell you that it is the duty of 
the Western treaty powers to combine for the pur- 
pose of coercing China into reforms which they 
may desire and which she may not desire — who 
undertake to say that this people have no rights 
which you are bound to respect. In their coarse 
language they say, " Take her by the throat." Using 
the tyrant's plea, they say they know better what 
China wants than China herself does. Not only do 
^they desire to introduce now the reforms born of 
n their own interests and their own caprices, but they 
tell you that the present dynasty must fall, and that 
the whole structure of Chinese civilisation must be 
overthrown. I know that these views are abhorred 
by the governments and the countries from which 
these people come; but they are far away from their 
countries, they are active, they are brave, they are 
unscrupulous, and, if they happen to be officials, it 
is in their power to complicate affairs and to involve, 
ultimately, their distant countries in war. Now it 
is against the malign spirit of this tyrannical ele- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 137 

ment that this Mission was sent forth to the Chris- 
tian world. It was sent forth that China might have 
her difficulties stated. That I happened to be at 
the head of it was, perhaps, more an accident than 
any design. It was, perhaps, because I had been 
longer there than any of my colleagues, and because 
I was about to leave; and, perhaps, more than all, 
because I was associated with the establishment of 
the co-operative policy which by the aid of abler 
men than myself was established not many years 
ago; and it is to sustain that policy — which has 
received the warm approval of all the great treaty 
powers, and which is cherished by China — that we 
are sent forth. It is in behalf of that generous 
policy, founded on principles of eternal justice, that 
I would rally the strongest thing on earth, the en- 
lightened public opinion of the world. Missions and ""x 
men may pass away, but the principles of eternal 
justice will stand. I desire that the autonomy of 
China may be preserved. I desire that her inde- 
pendence may be secured. I desire that she may 
have equality, that she may dispense equal pri v- X^ 
ileges to all nations. If the opposite school is to 
prevail, if you are to use coercion against that great 
people, then who are to exercise the coercion, whose 
force are you to use, whose views are you to estab- 
lish? You see the very attempt to carry out any 
such tyrannical policy would involve not only China, 
but would involve you in bloody wars with each 
other. There are men — men of that tyrannical 
school — who say that China is not fit to sit at the 
council board of the nations, who call her people 
barbarians, and attack them on all occasions with 
a bitter and unrelenting spirit. These things I ut- 
terly deny. I say, on the contrary, that that is a 



138 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

great, a noble people. It has all the elements of a 
splendid nationality. It is the most numerous peo- 
ple on the face of the globe; it is the most homo- 
geneous people in the world; it has a language spoken 
by more human beings than any other in the world, 
and it is written in the rock. It is a country where 
there is greater unification of thought than any other 
country in the world. It is a country where the 
maxims of great sages, coming down memorised for 
centuries, have permeated the whole people, until 
their knowledge is rather an instinct than an acquire- 
ment; a people loyal while living, and whose last 
prayer, when dying, is to sleep in the sacred soil of 
their fathers. . . . 
// China, seeing another civilisation approaching on 
every side, has her eyes wide open. She sees Russia 
on the north, Europe on the west, America on the 
east. She sees a cloud of sail on her coast, she sees 
the mighty steamers coming from everywhere — 
bow on. She feels the spark from the electric tele- 
graph falling hot upon her everywhere; she rouses 
herself, not in anger, but for argument. She finds 
that by not being in a position to compete with 
other nations for so long a time she has lost ground. 
She finds that she must come into relations with this 
civilisation that is pressing up around her, and feel- 
ing that, she does not wait but comes out to you and 
extends to you her hand. She tells you she is ready 
to take upon her ancient civilisation the graft of 
your civilisation. She tells you she is ready to take 
back her own inventions, with all their developments. 
She tells you that she is willing to trade with you, 
to buy of you, to sell to you, to help you strike off 
the shackles from trade. She invites your mer- 
chants, she invites your missionaries. She tells the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 139 

latter to plant the shining cross on every hill and in 
every valley. For she is hospitable to fair argu- 
ment. . . . 

Let her alone; let her have her independence; let 
her develop herself in her own time and in her own 
way. She has no hostility to you. Let her do this, 
and she will initiate a movement which will be felt 
in every workshop of the civilised world. She says 
now: "Send us your wheat, your lumber, your coal, 
your silver, your goods from everywhere — we will 
take as many of them as we can. We will give you 
back our tea, our silk, free labour, which we have sent 
so largely out into the world." It has overflowed 
upon Siam, upon the British provinces, upon Singa- 
pore, upon Manila, upon Peru, Cuba, Australia, and 
California. All she asks is that you will be as kind 
to her nationals as she is to your nationals. She 
wishes simply that you will do justice. She is will- 
ing not only to exchange goods with you, but she is 
willing to exchange thoughts. She is willing to give 
you what she thinks is her intellectual civilisation 
in exchange for your material civilisation. Let her 
alone, and the caravans on the roads of the north, 
toward Russia, will swarm in larger numbers than 
ever before. Let her alone, and that silver which 
has been flowing for hundreds of years into China, 
losing itself like the lost rivers of the West, but which 
yet exists, will come out into the affairs of men. . . . 
The imagination kindles at the future which may 
be, and which will be, if you will be fair and just to 
China. 

This was the speech which, more than any 
other of his public utterances, aroused the in- 
dignation of Europeans in the East against Mr. 



/ 



A 



140 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Burlingame. It was considered by its hearers 
to be a well-sustained burst of oratory finely 
fitted to the occasion; to those who were not 
present, and who were unsolicitous as to China's 
independence, it appeared as fanciful as do 
most announcements that exceed the compass 
of the commonplace. It is easy to depreciate 
such "bursts " on the morrow of such occasions 
when the lights of the banquets for which they 
are fashioned have been extinguished. But this 
was not an ordinary toast upon an ordinary 
festal occasion. It was an appeal before the bar 
of public opinion of an advocate inspired by some 
prenotion of a distant future that transcended 
the surmises of matter-of-course young men. 
Presentations of causes, especially radical causes 
which are to encounter opposition, are never made 
effectively in cool terms — it might almost be said 
are never expected to be so made— by men who 
feel strongly. If, transported by his emotion, 
the orator had to pay at the time the penalty 
which is ever incurred by seeming overstatement, 
and forfeited the advantage which his cause 
might have gained from a more temperate and 
closely reasoned address, his speech did no more 
than forecast a prospect which, with the passing 
of another cycle of Cathay, is now plainly revealed 
to all the world. What one generation called 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 141 

unreflecting declamation must be recognised by 
another as shrewdly determined reasoning. In 
America it was" soon forgotten in the engross- 
ment of a presidential campaign. When it was 
reported abroad his former friends ^ deplored its 
exaggeration and depreciated the results to be 
expected in China from a departure from the 
old policy of a "firm hand." His opponents 
gave vent to vituperation.^ 

It is hard at this date to read with patience 
the wasted indignation aroused by this deliver- 
ance among the mercantile bodies located at 
the Chinese ports, but it is not difficult to un- 
derstand the cause of their irritation. They were 
in the position of men who had long appropri- 
ated unfair but uncertain privileges at the ex- 
pense of weaker parties, for whom at last a 

^ "He placed the China question before his auditors in what we conceive 
to be an utterly distorted light, and as we think wholly misrepresented 
the attitude of the Chinese Government toward foreigners, and its desire 
for progress." (J. Barr Robertson, Westminster Review, vol. 93, p. 181, 
1870.) 

^ The following can hardly be called a serious document, but it was 
taken quite seriously by those for whom it was written: " We may, we 
think, state without hesitation, that no representative of a 'great nation' 
has ever delivered a public speech so abounding in wiKul misrepresenta- 
tions and empty declamation; so cunningly devised to mislead distant 
public opinion and the action of far-away statesmen; so deceptive in 
spirit no less than in tone, as is this speech of the Hon. Mr. Burlingame. 
What adds to its guilt is, that the speaker was the hired servant of a 
foreign, corrupt, semi-barbarous, and usurping government; that, solely 
in the dynastic interests of that government, he used his oratorical ef- 
forts both against the national interests of the people which he pre- 
tended to serve, and that, with notliing but falsehood on his lips and 



142 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

public champion had appeared. Like pohticians 
of a certain type in control of "easy graft," or 
like manufacturers enjoying the undue profits 
of a high protective tariff, they saw in any plan 
for adjusting affairs only a threat against their 
liberties and the life of trade. It is not nec- 
essary or befitting to represent these foreign 
communities in China as sorely corrupt. The 
majority of them were composed of men of in- 
tegrity. Yet the basis upon which they operated 
was disadvantageous in the extreme to China, 
and one which no self-respecting state could 
calmly endure. In this sense all the commercial 
bodies there must come under the same condem- 
nation. If Mr. Burlingame was forgetful of his 
own experience in China in declaring her states- 
men ready to welcome the foreigner and his in- 
novating improvements, he erred mainly through 
an excess of charity. The most that can be 
fairly brought against him seems to be that a 

guile on his brow, he imputes to honest men who mean well by China 
a tyrannic policy and destructive views of his own invention, in order 
that he may hold them up to the abhorrence of the West and the govern- 
ments of the West." (J. von Gumpach, "The Burlingame Mission," 
p. 287.) The editor of the North China Herald, who had welcomed 
the dispatch of the Mission as an indication that the Chinese were 
about to abandon their long-standing policy of isolation, comments as 
follows: "The conduct of Mr. Burlingame, the head of this Mission, 
has destroyed our pleasing anticipations. His absurd description of 
China in a public speech at New York has covered him with ridicule 
from all who know how widely different is the original from the pictiu-e." 
("Retrospect of Political and Commercial Affairs," Shanghai, 1873, p. 8.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 143 

righteous indignation in behalf of a greatly 
wronged people tempted him to overstatement 
in a cause where the simple truth was sufficient 
to carry conviction to open minds. An English 
writer arrived at a truer estimate than most of 
the critics of the moment when, writing a year 
later, he concluded that, however erroneous in 
its superlatives, this speech 

was only calculated to mislead those who were totally 
ignorant of China and its people. He would un- 
doubtedly have better served his cause — the cause 
of China — if he had stated the plain truth and put 
no gloss whatever on the facts of the case. If he 
had boldly proclaimed in every court in Europe that 
there were statesmen in power in China who believed 
progress in many directions, if not desirable at least 
inevitable, and were therefore willing to take such 
steps as they thought consistent with safety in that 
direction; but that they were a very small minority, 
and were engaged in a constant struggle with a large 
and powerful party in the state, comprising nearly 
the whole of the official class, with an unknown pro- 
portion of the population thoroughly anti-foreign in 
all their feelings and prejudices, wedded to the phil- 
osophy and traditions of their ancestors, and form- 
ing a compact body of resistance to all progress or 
innovation, he would have given a true account of 
China as it is, and have better served her cause in the 
end than by any highly coloured pictures of an imag- 
inary Chinese Empire. He might have truly and 
wisely added that to force upon the few more enlight- 
ened members of the government measures they are 



144 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

not able to carry through would be merely to insure 
their removal from power, and precipitate either a 
war or a revolution — but in all probability both. . . . 
To perpetually humiliate the Tsung-li Yamen with 
imperious demands for sweeping changes which they 
have constantly declared their inability to initiate, 
and by perpetual interference with their customs and 
internal administration, is simply to play into the 
hands of the reactionary party. ^ 

A month after his return to Washington after 
the banquet in New York, Mr. Burlingame 
signed the treaty between China and the United 
States which has ever since been associated with 
his name. This compact, in the form of eight 
additional articles to the Tientsin treaty of 
June 18, 1858, had been the subject of conver- 
sations during the preceding month, and was 
drafted by Mr. Seward in accordance with his 
own ideas of what was right and proper under 
the circumstances. No notes or documents re- 
lating to the negotiation exist in the state de- 
partment, nor is it likely that it was conducted 
in any other way than by personal collocutions 
in the secretary's office, where the draft was 
first presented to Mr. Burlingame. The occa- 
sion for this informal proceeding is explained in 
a letter of June 14, 1911, to the writer from the 
Hon. Frederick W. Seward: 

^ "China's Relation to Foreign Powers," Edinburgh Review, January, 
1871. p. 197. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 145 

It is difficult for any one, nowadays, to fully realise 
the intense political excitement and bitterness that 
prevailed in Washington in 1867 and 1868. It 
seemed as if Congress and the nation had gone daft 
over the question of impeaching President Johnson. 
Every other subject was subordinated and mis- 
construed by some supposed connection therewith. 
The treaty with China, like the treaty for Russian 
America, was a measure of prime diplomatic im- 
portance. But neither treaty could have been con- 
cluded by the ordinary methods of diplomacy. 
Correspondence and discussion would instantly have 
aroused antagonisms that would be fatal. The 
negotiations in each case had to be conducted by 
means of personal interviews and confidential con- 
versations between the secretary of state and the 
foreign minister. It is for that reason that you find 
so little in the official records — published and un- 
published. Even our private correspondence had 
to be jealously guarded. Fortunately, in both cases, 
the governments were in full accord, and their re- 
spective representatives had entire confidence in 
each other. 

Aware of the determination of the British 
Government to revise their treaty with China i 
at this time, the American secretary of state ex- j 
perienced some natural gratification at the fa- 
vourable opportunity of the visit of a Chinese 
embassy to the United States, under the leader- 
ship of an American, to propose an amendment 
of the American convention of 1858. Quite 
content to leave the vexed questions of tariff 



146 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

and transit dues to the British negotiators, it 
seemed necessary to stipulate for only a few 
changes — to modify the former compact in 
conformity with the Burlingame policy of a 
more liberal treatment of China and to secure 
a plentiful supply of labour for the Western 
States. His proposal, though unexpected, was 
cordially accepted in principle by Mr. Burlin- 
game in the interest of the country he repre- 
sented. That the suggestion first came from 
the secretary and not from Mr. Burlingame may 
be inferred from a dispatch to Mr. Browne, the 
new American minister to China (September 8, 
1868), in which Mr. Seward refers him to Mr. 
Williams's motion of the previous May that 
negotiations for a revision of the American 
treaty with China be commenced during the 
coming year "to obtain the same advantages 
for our countrymen which others enjoy." He 
then adds — a little complacently, in view of 
the prolonged wrangle over amendments to the 
British treaty under discussion between Sir R. 
Alcock and the Tsung-li officials: "The addi- 
tional articles to the treaty of June 18, 1858, 
which were concluded here on the 28th of June 
last, which have been duly ratified by the Presi- 
dent of the United States, and which have al- 
ready been sent to Peking for the purpose of 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 147 

being ratified there by the Chinese Government, 
embrace all the subjects which this government 
has deemed to be essential, at the present time, 
to adjust by an immediate revision of the treaty 
of 1858." Mr. Seward's son reflects his father's 
opinion when he says of his treaty that China 
"now gave her adhesion to the principles of 
Western law and to more advanced doctrines 
in regard to human rights than most Western 
nations had yet been able to adopt." ^ 

The text of the eight additional articles is 
given in an appendix; for convenience they may 
be briefly summarised here: I, recognises China's 
right to unmolested dominion over her own ter- 
ritories and her jurisdiction over persons and 
property in the concessions, except as relinquished 
by treaty; II, concedes her control over inland 
trade and navigation; III, grants her the right 
to appoint consuls to American ports; IV, in- 
sures freedom from persecution for foreign relig- 
ions in either country and protection for ceme- 
teries; V, allows unrestricted voluntary migra- 
tion between China and the United States, and 
forbids the coohe trade; VI, admits reciprocal^ 
rights of travel and residence, but forbids nat- 
uralisation by either party of citizens of the 
other; VII, opens schools in each country to 

^ "Seward at Washington," III, p. 381. 



148 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

children of the other; and VIII, acknowledges 
the right of the Emperor to make internal im- 
provements unobstructed by foreign dictation 
or intervention, as well as his right to introduce 
such improvements when and as he pleases. 

Before discussing the treaty it will be well to 
follow Mr. Burlingame's exposition of its prin- 
cipal articles delivered in a speech at a dinner 
given to him on August 21 by the city council 
in Boston: 

In the first place, it declares the neutrality of the 
Chinese waters in opposition to the pretensions of 
V the e xterritoriali ty rlnrtn'rip;, that inasmuch as the 
persons and the property of the people of the foreign 
powers were under the jurisdiction of those powers, 
therefore it was the right of parties contending with 
each other to attack each other in the Chinese waters, 
thus making those waters the place of their conflict. 
The treaty traverses all such absurd pretensions. 
It strikes down the so-called c oncessio n doctrines, 
under which the nationals of different countries 
located upon spots of land in the treaty ports had 
come to believe that they could take jurisdiction 
there not only of their own nationals, not only of 
the person and property of their own people, but 

ytake jurisdiction of the Chinese and the people of 
other countries. When this question was called 
under discussion and referred to the home govern- 
ments, not by the Chinese originally, but by those 
foreign nations who felt that their treaty rights were 
being abridged by these concession doctrines, the 
distant foreign countries could not stand the discus- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 149 

sion for a moment. And I aver that every treaty 
power has abandoned the concession doctrines, 
though some of their officials at the present time in 
China undertake to contend for them, undertake to 
expel the Chinese, to attack the Chinese, to protect 
the Chinese, although the territory did not belong 
to them. China has never abandoned her eminent 
domain, never abandoned on that territory her juris- 
diction, and I trust she never will. This treaty 
strikes down all the pretensions about concessions 
of territory. 

Again , this treaty recognises Chin a as an equal 
among the nations, in opposition to the old doctrine 
that because she was not a Christian nation she 
could not be placed in the roll of nationsy But I 
will not discuss that question. The greatest living 
authority upon Eastern questions is here to-night — 
Mr. Cushing. He has stated that position more , 
fully than anybody else, while his heart has leaned 
ever up to the side of the Chinese. I say China has 
been put upon terms of equality. Her subjects have 
been put upon a footing with those of the most fa- 
voured nations, so that now the Chinese stands with 
the Briton or the Frenchman, the Russian, the Prus- 
sian, and everybody else. And not only so, but by 
a consulary clause in that treaty they are given a 
diplomatic status by which those privileges can be 
defended. That t reaty also strikes down all dis- 
abilities on account oT"religious faith. It recalls the 
great doctrine of the Constitution which gives to a 
man the right to hold any faith which his conscience 
may dictate to him. Under that treaty the Chinese 
may spread their marble altars to the blue vault of 
heaven and may worship the spirit which dwells 
beyond. That treaty opens the gleaming gates of 



150 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

our public institutions to the students of China. 
That treaty strikes down, or reprobates — that is the 
word — the infamous cooHe trade. It sustains the 
law of 1862, drafted by Mr. Elliot, of Massachusetts, 
and pledges the nations forever to hold that trade 
criminal. _While_ it does this it recognises the great 
doctrine that a man may change his home and change 
his allegiance. It invites free immigration into the 
country of those sober and industrious people, by 
whose quiet labour we have been enabled to push 
the Pacific railroad over the summits of the Sierra 
Nevada. Woollen mills have been enabled to run 
on account of this labour with profit, and the crops 
of California, more valuable than all her gold, have 
been gathered by them. I am glad that the United 
States had the courage to apply her great principles 
of equality. I am glad that while she applies her 
doctrines to the swarming millions of Europe, she 
is not afraid to apply them to the tawny race of 
Tamerlane and of Genghis Khan. 

There is another article which is also important 
to China. It has been the habit of foreigners in 
China to lecture the Chinese and to say what they 
should do and what they should not do; in fact, to 
prefer almost a demand and say when they should 
build railroads, when they should build telegraphs; 
and, in fact, there has been an attempt to take entire 
possession of their affairs. This treaty denounces 
all such pretensions. It says particularly that it is 
for the Chinese themselves to determine when they 
will institute reforms, that they are the masters of 
their own affairs, that it is for them to make com- 
mercial regulations and do whatever they will, 
which is not in violation of the law of nations, within 
their own territory. I am glad that that is in the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 151 

treaty; and while the treaty expresses the opinion 
of the United States in favour of giving to China 
the control of her own affairs, it assumes that China 
is to progress, and it offers to her all the resources 
of Western science, and asks other nations to do the 
same. The United States have asked nothing for 
themselves. I am proud of it. I am proud that 
this country has made a treaty which is, every line 
of it, in the present interests of China, though in the 
resulting interests of all mankind. I am glad that 
the country has risen up to a level with the great 
occasion. I am glad that she has not asked any 
mean advantages, such as weaken one people and 
do not exalt another. By leaving China free in all 
these respects, she feels secure, or will feel secure 
when these principles are adopted; when she feels 
that the railroad and the telegraph are not to be the 
instruments by which she is to be disrupted or de- 
stroyed. She will come out of her seclusion and enter 
upon a course of trade, the importance of which and 
the amount of which no man can compute. The 
first thing for her to have is security ; and this treaty 
gives her security. It places her broadly under in- 
ternational law. 

I know this treaty will be attacked; you will 
wonder at it. It will be attacked by the spirit of 
the old indigo planters in India; resisted by the 
spirit of the old opium smuggler in China. But, 
notwithstanding all this, I believe that treaty, or 
the principles of that treaty, will make the tour of 
the world because it is founded in right, is founded 
in justice. Believing that, the members of this Mis- 
sion, feeling confidence in the rectitude of their 
intentions, confidence in the merits of the policy 
which they have pursued, do not ask what recep- 



152 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

tion they shall have in the countries to which they 
go, but trust themselves fairly and fully to the spirit 
of Western civilisation. 

From the stand-point of diplomatic conven- 
tion as observed in Europe there is no denying 
that Mr. Burlingame's participation in conclud- 
ing this contract was irregular. He had been 
granted no specific instructions to negotiate 
treaties abroad, and had he declared his inten- 
tion of doing so before leaving Peking, it is ex- 
tremely unlikely that the Tsung-li Yamen would 
have appointed him. Nevertheless, though he 
took that office by surprise, he could contend 
that as they had given him no definite orders 
such action was naturally included among those 
matters which were left to his own judgment. 
To this contention he could add the assertion 
that the document must necessarily be submit- 
ted to their ratification to accede to or refuse 
as they chose, and that it was plainly drawn up 
in their interests, so that the relations of China 
with a Western power were for the first time 
placed upon an enduring basis of goodwill and 
mutual accord. And to this extent he was jus- 
tified in the event. After a struggle with the 
reactionaries, the outcome of which will demand 
further treatment in the sequel, the party of 
Prince Kung persuaded the Empress-Dowager 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 153 

to accept the advantages thus unexpectedly 
offered them by this most paradoxical of "bar- 
barian" nations.^ 

The popularity of the new treaty was very 
great in the United States as soon as its provi- 
sions were published. This appears to have 
been especially the case on the Pacific coast, 
where the planters and manufacturers were grat- 
ified at the prospect of a larger labour supply. 
On his way to Peking the new minister, Mr. J. 
Ross Browne, informs the state department of 
the amicable sentiments of the Californians in 
the following personal note to its chief clerk, Mr. 
Robert S. Chew : " It may interest you to know," 
he writes from Oakland the day before sailing, 
"that the new treaty as reported by telegraph 
has met with the cordial indorsement of the 
press of California. There is no unfriendly feel- 
ing here toward the Chinese among the influ- 

^ The foreign mercantile class in China objected more strenuously to 
the treaty than the Chinese reactionaries. Here is a typical specimen 
of their criticisms: "It has been caustically said that the document was 
a mere advertisement for Mr. Burlingame to show European courts that 
he was not a mere ambassadorial shadow, but a real plenipotential envoy. 
At any rate it is an unfortunate document, for its purport is decidedly 
retrogressive as regards foreigners, though it raises China to a footing 
of mere (sic) perfect equality and relieves Chinese from disadvantages 
under which they had previously suffered in California. ... It was 
distinctly unwise to expressly abandon pressure at a time when it was 
being usefully exerted to induce the Chinese authorities to open up the 
mineral resources of their country." ("A Retrospect of Political and 
Commercial Affairs in China," reprinted from the North China Herald, 
Shanghai, 1873, p. 9.) 



154 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

ential and respectable class of the community. 
The objections urged against them are purely 
of a local and political character, and are con- 
fined chiefly to the lower classes of Irish. A 
much more liberal sentiment now prevails on 
this subject than formerly. . . ." ^ His opinion 
is reflected in the journals of that date, but the 
*' lower classes of Irish" were presently able to 
overwhelm the influential and .respectable ele- 
ment in California, as they have, occasionally, 
elsewhere in the world. Throughout the country 
the newspaper press in commenting on the treaty 
re-echoed almost automatically the pleasantness 
and peace that had been extolled during the 
journeys of the Mission about the land. It cost 
them nothing to do so, but the following exor- 
dium to a discussion of '*Our Future Relations 
with China," from the San Francisco Evening 
Bulletin,^ reveals something more than the inex- 
pensive morality usual in editorials : 

It should not be forgotten that the liberal treaty 
just concluded, while it secures new privileges for 
Americans abroad, imposes new duties upon them 
at home. There must be an abandonment of the 
wretched proscription which has characterised our 
domestic policy toward the Chinese, and which has 

1 United States Department of State, MS. vol., "China," vol. 28, 
Browne to Chew, August 2, 1868. 

2 July 31, 1868. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 155 

led to a degree of injustice and cruelty which would 
have provoked a war had it been practised upon our 
own people in China or Japan. What there is in 
Chinese habits and morals which is properly ob- 
noxious to us, we are amply protected against by 
the character of our own race and institutions, and 
perhaps no better missionary work can be done than 
to set the example in our own conduct of forbear- 
ance and toleration. For all that is good in them 
they can be utilised as they come voluntarily among 
us without disparagement or peril to ourselves. 
Consular representation will enable them to demand 
the equal protection hitherto refused them in this 
state, and the Fourteenth Constitutional Amendment 
will compel its extension. California cannot longer 
defy the national sentiment on this point, and no 
political capital can be made by future demagogue 
appeals to a brutal or unreasonable prejudice. 

Shortly after our platonic declaration of the 
desirability of international intercourse and free 
migration, apprehensions concerning the influx 
of Chinese labourers on the Pacific coast of the 
United States caused a profound change of sen- 
timent, and ultimately resulted in a policy of 
exclusion as severe as any which the Chinese 
autocrat had in times past decreed against the 
Caucasian. It has never been a characteristic 
of the white race to exercise urbanity when its 
particular interests are menaced. Had the Chi- 
nese, when they apprehended a similar threat 
in the presence of foreigners on their own soil. 



156 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

acted as vigorously as the Americans did after 
1869, we should, perhaps, have understood them 
better and respected them more, whatever the 
outcome of the contest might have been; or it 
may be that if we had been rather less contempt- 
uous of them we should have felt more of that 
hatred which is born of fear. With the troubles 
which began in California and continued with 
more or less acrimony for forty years this study 
has, fortunately, nothing to do. Their only re- 
lation to Mr. Burlingame lies in the contumely 
which was thereby heaped upon his name as the 
/author of a clause allowing the free immigration 
of Chinese into America. Yet there is no evi- 
dence that he was the originator of the anathe- 
matised article recognising "the inherent and 
inalienable right of man to change his home and 
allegiance, and also the mutual advantage of the 
free migration and emigration of their subjects 
respectively." The doctrine had been insisted 
upon ever since 1766, and its corollary, the right 
of expatriation, had been proclaimed in a reso- 
lution voted by Congress two days before the 
treaty was signed. Though accepted by Mr. 
Burlingame, the clause bears internal evidence 
of Seward's contrivance,'^ for the express purpose 

^ Dr. W. A. P. Martin gives direct testimony to this effect: "The 
draft of that document was drawn up, not by Mr. Burlingame, as gener- 
ally supposed, but by Mr. Seward, as the ' great secretary ' himself told 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 157 

of encouraging the immigration of Chinese la- 
bourers for the Pacific railway. It was on behalf 
of this favourite project that he reprobated the 
rising feeling against Asiatics in California dur- 
ing his visit to that State in the following year, 
and until his death he remained strongly op- 
posed to the reaction.^ 

The price paid by Mr. Burlingame for his 
facile success with the people of America was, 
therefore, the resentment of a majority of the 
foreign residents in the Far East, and a long 
period of obloquy under which his name suffered 
among his countrymen in the Far West.^ Yet, 
so far as he was accountable to his clients in 
drawing up this document, he may be said to 
have served them handsomely, for by it Chinese * 

me with no little satisfaction; but it goes without saying that he embodied 
the ideas of the Chinese envoys." ("A Cycle of Cathay," New York, 
1896, p. 376.) 

1" While in California in 1869 he did not hesitate to protest against 
the almost unanimous feeling pervading the community against Chinese 
immigration. He condemned the policy of exclusion and persistently 
maintained that immigration was an element of civilisation, especially to j( 

the Pacific coast, and that the attempt to suppress its invigorating forces ^ 
would ultimately prove a failure." (" Seward's Works," vol. V, p. 50.) 

2 One example from the voluminous literature on Chinese immigration 
to America will suffice: "We charge that Anson Burlingame sold his 
country's birthright for Chinese money. . . . For the purpose of ob- 
taining prestige, with which he might work upon Great Britain in the 
interest of China and earn his fee, Mr. Burlingame induced his country 
to yield up a sovereign attribute never before surrendered by any free 
people. ... It was conceived in fraud and chicane. It was negotiated 
at a time when no treaty was wanted by either country, and not for the 
purpose named in the treaty." ("Memorial to Congress," drafted by 
F. Swift and others, 1886.) 



X 



158 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

in America were to be treated exactly — with 
the right of naturaHsation reserved — as were 
foreigners from Europe. China had achieved 
no such recognition for her subjects abroad 
from other Christian states. The mistake in the 
treaty, to which ensuing years lent an unpleasant 
emphasis, does not appear to have been the fault 
of the negotiator on the part of China so much 
as that of the one on the part of the United 
States. This was its needless turning into an 
express stipulation, requiring formal diplomacy 
and statutes to modify, a privilege which both 
parties to the contract already enjoyed to their 
own satisfaction by custom and tacit under- 
standing. Such was the e mbarrassm ent Ameri- 
cans brought upon themselves by declaring the 
right of migration to be inalienable, and promis- 
ing Chinese subjects in America what they had 
not themselves asked for — the same ''immuni- 
ties and exemptions" as we accorded the sub- 
jects of all other nations. We thus committed 
ourselves unnecessarily to a principle which, in a 
few years, we repudiated most shabbily. Sub- 
sequently the case for America was made worse 
by attempts of Congress and State legislatures 
to pass laws in plain contravention of this and 
other treaties. Under such indignities China, 
having no desire to encourage the emigration of 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 159 

her subjects abroad, preserved a commendable 
patience, and conceded to us the further restric- 
tions demanded of her. But her statesmen, 
though happily unconscious of the troubles in 
store for them, were justified in their hesitation 
to accept a compact which seemed to them super- 
fluous at the time, and to offer them terms thc^ 
fulfilment of which their experience of Western 
powers did not guarantee. 

Professor Mayo Smith concludes his discus- 
sion of this phase of a highly controversial ques- 
tion as follows: "As a matter of fact, it does 
not appear that the Burlingame treaty changed 
the actual condition of things very much. The 
privileges granted to American citizens in China 
in regard to trade and religion were precisely 
those granted in the treaty of 1858. China 
promised to treat American citizens in the same 
way that she treated the subjects of the most 
favoured nation. She promised to do no more 
now. The reciprocal privileges granted to the 
Chinese of free exercise of their religion here, 
and to Americans of free entrance to the educa- '' 
tional institutions of China, were of no practical 
value, because one was already enjoyed and the 
other would hardly be desired. The position of 
the Chinese here was precisely that which they 
had always shared with other foreigners. The 



160 ANSON BURLINGAME 

only privilege which they had not enjoyed or of 
which their enjoyment was doubtful (namely, 
of naturalisation) was expressly withheld by the 
treaty." ^ 

^ "Emigration and Immigration," p. 233. 



THE CLARENDON LETTER AND 
BRITISH POLICY 

IF Mr. Burlingame had arrived In America 
with some sense of trepidation, he departed 
in triumph. He had spoken to his country- 
men with singleness of heart of a great purpose, 
and his appeal to their higher instincts had 
succeeded almost beyond his hopes. With no 
intimation of the reaction against the treaty pro- 
visions in favour of the Chinese, which were soon 
to excite the distrust of the Pacific States, he left 
his native land happy in the confidence that he 
had been instrumental in inducing a strong na- 
tion "to give a weaker one her rights from mo- 
tives of impartial justice and generosity." ^ In 
a sketch of his life contributed to the New York 
Times,^ a writer describes Mr. Burlingame on the 
eve of sailing for Europe, sitting up far into the 
morning with a few personal friends, speaking 
"of the future that he saw before China and the 
United States with rapturous enthusiasm, and 
of the Mission in Europe with hope, but not 
without concern." 

1 J. L. Nevius, " China and the Chinese," New York, 1869, p. 440. 
' February 24, 1870. 

161 



162 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

He expected no such welcome in England as 
he had received in America. Not only was 
there a difference in national temperament be- 
tween the two halves of the Anglo-Saxon race, 
but Englishmen entertained exaggerated ideas 
of the significance of this Mission, and were dis- 
posed to indulge in assumptions about its im- 
mediate purpose which the occasion could not 
warrant.^ The new treaty was pronounced by 
the man in the street in London to be an Ameri- 
can success obtained from China at the expense 
of Great Britain. There was not much love lost 
at that time between Englishmen and Americans ; 
responsibility for the Trent affair, for the Ala- 
bama captures, and for paralysis in the cotton 
industries was still laid at the door of the 
Yankees while awaiting adjudication in the 
courts or in the minds of men; and, apart from 
a general sentiment against America that preju- 
diced the upper classes in England, the honest 

^ This was the case, indeed, on both sides of the Atlantic. The editor 
of the Eclectic Magazine (New York, September, 1868) hails Mr. Bur- 
lingame as the "head of a Mission the most important, perhaps, in the 
annals of diplomacy, . . . the herald of a new epoch, the inaugurator 
of a revolution the most momentous the East has seen for two thousand 
years." A writer in the October number of the Westminster Review de- 
scribes it as "one of the most irrevocable steps that the Chinese Govern- 
ment has ever taken." Again, "A Resident of Seventeen Years in 
China" appeals to the London Times (July 8, 1868) against "the attempt 
on the part of Mr. Burlingame to reverse our policy in China. If Mr. 
Burlingame succeeds, then, sir, we shall, without a doubt, be involved 
in wars, though not in the direction indicated by Mr. Burlingame," 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 163 

Englishman was devoutly convinced that China 
owed everything to his countrymen. To the 
public at large, mindful of their past achieve- 
ments, and of the enormous preponderance of /^ 
their interests in the Far East, Asia as a con- 
tinent in need of reclamation appeared to be 
Britain's particular province for exploitation and 
control. The new treaty seemed to imply a pre- 
posterous concession; it recognised the equality X 
of Asiatics with Europeans, and the prospect of 
the upstart American in a leading role, challeng- 
ing at once the adequacy of the accepted theory 
and the rationale of British primacy in the East, 
was repugnant in the extreme. 

In contrasting the attitude of America and 
Europe at this period no inference need be 
drawn as to the moral superiority of either in 
its policy toward China. Substantially the same 
standards obtained on both sides of the inter- 
vening ocean. The same arrogance of dominant ^ 
materialism, slightly mitigated by the gospel of 
charity, alike controlled all the nations of Chris- 
tendom, and it controls them still. In the new 
world, however, where the forces of society were 
absorbed in repairing the losses of the Civil 
War and in developing the great resources of the 
country, Asiatic affairs presented only remote 
and speculative interests that touched the per- 



164 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

sonal concerns of scarcely one in a hundred 
thousand of the population. A few moralists 
and men of ideas could readily arouse audiences 
to the crying needs of pagan China, and the du- 
ties of Christian governments toward a derelict 
empire that threatened no Western power and 
even offered prospective advantages of commerce. 
To common men and politicians who represented 
them in their legislatures, China was another 
world. But when their interests at home seemed 
to be menaced by the presence of a few thou- 
sand competing Asiatic labourers in California 
and elsewhere, the "heathen Chinee" instantly 
ceased to be the harmless representative of an 
outworn and necessitous nation, and Americans 
in their new-found fears arose to denounce him 
in terms as illiberal as any that had been in- 
vented in England. All that can be urged in 
behalf of the United States at this juncture is 
the fact that its government resolutely sustained 
its honour against the attacks of Congress and 
the politicians by enforcing treaty protection, 
and that a sturdy minority of thoughtful men 
there remained true to the Burlingame doctrine 
of laissez vivre toward China. 

In Europe the problem of China was of more 
pressing importance. England's stake in the 
Oriental trade, being greater than that of any 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 165 

other nation, gave her a sort of primacy in or- 
dering the pohcy of the West toward the East. 
Her success in this great business had bred up 
a considerable number of men whose wealth, 
accumulated in dealings with Asiatics, brought 
them prominence at home and prestige as experts 
in an obscure and difficult process. They were 
accustomed to be consulted in all matters in- 
volving Eastern peoples. Their authority was 
thought to be justified by the prudence and skill 
with which they had won prosperity under anom- 
alous conditions. They cannot, on the whole, 
be accused of impropriety so far as their per- 
sonal transactions with the Chinese were con- 
cerned. But merchants, as a class, are never 
idealists, or the best representatives of the high- X 
est ethical standards of their country, nor are 
they apt to be pro gressive s. Men of this very 
proper sort, having spent the best years of their 
lives in amassing fortunes amongst alien peoples 
in whose institutions they had no concern, kept 
aloof from the "natives" while residing in the 
East, but confidently aired their opinions upon 
Oriental subjects on returning home where there 
were few to dispute their claims to wisdom. 
"There is perhaps no country in the world fre- 
quented by the English-speaking race," writes 
one of the ablest British consuls of this period. 



166 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

*'in which merchants are so lamentably ignorant 
of the customs and resources of the locality in 
which they live as they are at this moment in 
China, and this is entirely to be attributed to a 
want^of familiarity with the language." ^ Yet 
this was the class with which England took 
council — a class inheriting traditions formed 
under the old East India Company regime, with 
such enlargements as their wider opportunites 
suggested. Successful collisions with the Chinese 
authorities had taught them that any object 
might be attained in that land if a European 
government could be induced to support it by 
a show of force. They were much too limited 
in their political insight to perceive that this 
method of promoting trade operations involved 
such loss of prestige to the Chinese state as to 
bring about the series of rebellions that had al- 
ready devastated two-thirds of China and sapped 
its resources. These rebellions, moreover, opened 
the way to a new species of Europeans, sheer 
adventurers^ whose presence in the empire stul- 

» W. H. Medhurst, "The Foreigner in Far Cathay," London, 1872, p. 30. 

* A memorial of Messrs. Jardine, Matheson & Co., to the governor of 
Hongkong acknowledges that "the privileges conceded by the treaty, 
the enforcement of which we now advocate, were at the time of their 
concession calculated, perhaps, to throw broadcast upon the empire a 
lawless body of men, unacquainted with restraint and amenable to no 
authority; for not only was the general temper of the foreign mind then 
exultant and unruly, but the common desire of both imperialists and 
rebels to avail of them for military purposes had attracted to the shores 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 167 

tified the honourable efforts of their diplomatic 
representatives to bring her oflScials into accord 
with the true principles of Christian civilisation. 
When to these elements of ignorance and evil 
from the West are added the iniquitous continu- 
ance of a traffic in opium utterly detestable to 
the ideas of high-minded Chinese, some concep- 
tion may be obtained of the social and com- 
mercial antagonism to Mr. Burlingame's Mis- 
sion, and of the need of a valorous and eager 
idealist determined to arouse the conscience of 
Christendom to its duty. 

When the idealist appeared he met with the 
reception usually given to men of his kind. We 
have been told that a prophet is not without 
honour save in his own country; in the present 
instance the reverse seemed to be true. His 
propaganda had been palpably successful at 
home, and this success did not, under the cir- 
cumstances, improve his chances for convert- 
ing the British to his views. Nevertheless, the 
contrast involved in the welcome given him by 
the two countries w^as more striking in appear- 
ance than in the real issue. The triumph secured 
in America was transient, and, in the nature of 

of China a most ungovernable collection of abandoned adventurers." 
("Memorials Presented by the Chambers of Commerce in China to the 
British Minister." " Parliamentary Papers,," presented February 24, 
1868, p. 31.) 



168 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the case, bound to be so. His cause was of a 
sort to discredit its upholder in popular esteem 
wherever it was seen to affect the pockets of 
men, and time alone could justify the pecuniary- 
sacrifice demanded. Human society is so con- 
stituted that however willing it may be to for- 
give reformers who have vindicated their claims 
in a particular group, there is no popular plaudit 
for the knight-errant who devotes his life to the 
cause of another race or nation. The champion 
of an international suit is almost doomed to be 
discredited or forgotten. Mr. Burlingame's in- 
difference to the loss of popularity inevitable in 
the pursuit of this policy was a witness to his 
deepening character, and this deepening pro- 
ceeded step by step with his growing conviction 
that to reverse the old attitude of the West 
toward the East was to take the first stride 
toward insuring the prosperity of the world for 
another century. The opposition of vested in- 
terests to this plea for a mistreated people awak- 
ened in him the same eagerness which had in his 
earlier days inspired his attacks upon slavery. 
It even mattered little to him that he might for 
a time be misunderstood by the court and coun- 
try he was serving. As the champion of a great 
cause he could afford to wait until they were 
freed from the shackles of an antique conserva- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 169 

tism and became aware of the security he had 
won for them. 

Allusion has already been made to the con- 
tumely poured upon the treaty by Europeans in 
China, and something more will presently be 
said of their antagonism. The common opin- 
ion at the treaty ports was that under a prin- 
ciple of equal treatment to Chinese and foreign- yL 
ers in commercial and diplomatic matters life 
would no longer be worth living to the latter. 
In England its unpopularity, such as it was, 
arose from a sentiment of dislike toward Ameri- 
cans and suspicions of their motives in directing 
a new policy in regard to China. Its provisions 
appeared to the moral Englishman as a bid for 
Chinese favours from America, to which country 
China owed nothing, while she was bound by 
positive and weighty obligations to England. 
Surely the Chinese ought to know, despite their 
defeats in^hree wars, their loss of an island, their 
acquired taste for opium, and the destruction of 
an Emperor's palace, that Britain was their best 
friend^ who had imparted a few wholesome les- 
sons, indeed, but who had enriched them by 
trade and saved a dynasty tottering upon its 
throne. It appeared incredible to the thought- 
ful observer in London that China could inter- 
pret the events of the past half-century in her 



170 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

own fashion and deny the advantages of things 
thrust upon her which she did not want. To 
behold her now turning for help to America in- 
dicated either the machinations of another power 
— presumably Russia — or a desperate attempt 
to return to the old Hermit-Nation expedient. 
"We rise from the perusal of this treaty," de- 
clares one of these representatives of British in- 
sularity, "with the conviction that there is more 
under it than appears on the surface. It bears 
distinct trace of foreign inspiration, and it is 
our belief that this inspiration did not originate 
with the Chinese Government at all; that the 
idea of enlisting Mr. Burlingame as a temporary 
recruit for furthering Chinese ends, so far from 
being spontaneous, emanated from a foreign 
brain, and was suggested by the departure of 
the American envoy, then on the eve of quitting 
Peking. The plan was no doubt cordially wel- 
comed by the Chinese ministers, who, having 
but one object at heart, gave but one instruc- 
tion — *Stop all progress; as to the rest, carte 
blanche; say and do what you like.' The treaty 
concocted by the Mission on its passage from 
China is the result before us.'* ^ 

Without pausing to comment upon the charm- 
ing if unconscious touch of arrogance implied 

i^The Times, London, September 2. 1868. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 171 

in the statement that the treaty was concocted 
by the mission in America on its passage to the 
centre of civih'sation, it is enough to conclude 
that pubhc opinion in England, though preju- 
diced, was not actually hostile. The press in 
London paid little attention to the Mission dur- 
ing the elections which occurred in the month 
of November, and assumed a waiting attitude. 
A ruffled reader of the Times complains (October 
16), that "if the Hereditary Grand Duke of the 
Stiff und Starkenstein had paid us a visit a 
special train would have conveyed his Serenity 
from Southampton to London, a deputation of 
directors would have been in attendance at each 
railway terminus, and her Majesty's carriages, 
accompanied perhaps by a squad of Life Guards, 
would have conveyed the stranger to Windsor. 
. . . But for the representatives of one-half of 
mankind we have no national welcome to offer. 
For all we hear of them they might be a group 
of private gentlemen who had come to London 
to see the Tower and Mme. Tussaud's wax works. 
I know enough of Chinamen to feel pretty con- 
fident about their feelings on the subject, and 
if it be our aim to humiliate and vex them our 
policy is likely to meet with entire success. 
But the Americans, who are not bad judges in 
such matters, acted on quite a different prin- 



172 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

ciple when they had such an opportunity as we 
are now neglecting. I can imagine the astute 
New Englander who is at the head of the Em- 
bassy smihng grimly over our mistake." 

The criticism was shrewd, but the emphasis 
was rather excessive. The China of 1868 had 
no idea that she was risking her national repu- 
tation in this Mission and little that she was 
thereby advertising herself to new friends; had 
a suspicion of this been entertained it would not 
have been sent. 

After waiting a month in London the envoys 
were presented to the Queen at Windsor on 
November 20 by Lord Stanley. A fortnight 
later Disraeli's ministry was replaced by Glad- 
stone's as a result of the Liberal victory at the 
polls, and fortune favoured Mr. Burlingame in 
the appointment of Lord Clarendon as minister 
of foreign affairs, a statesmen whose whole life 
may be said to have been devoted to the cause 
of peace and progress. With such a man the 
envoy's powers of direct appeal were certain to 
prove effective. An interview in the Foreign 
Office on December 26 resulted in the following 
letter from Lord Clarendon, from the publica- 
tion of which has been dated the demise of 
Palmerston's *' strong-hand" policy in Asia 
and the establishment of intercourse upon the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 173 

principles propounded by Bruce and Burlin- 
game in Peking.^ 

Foreign Office, December 28, 1868. 

Sir: I gathered, from the conversation which I 
had the honour to have with you on the 26th inst., 
that the objects of the Chinese Government in send- 
ing a diplomatic mission to Europe were twofold; 
one, that by means of such a mission the European 
powers might be disabused of an impression which it 
was supposed at Peking that they entertained, that 
the Chinese Government had entered upon a retro- 
grade policy, and contemplated not only refusal to 
enlarge their relations with Christian nations, but 
even restrictions within narrower limits of the inter- 
course which, under treaty, those nations were en- 
titled to hold with the Chinese dominions; the other, 
to depreciate any intention on the part of European 
powers to bring to bear on China any amount of 
unfriendly pressure to induce her rulers to enter 
precipitately on a new system of policy which would 
seriously affect her independence. 

I understood from you that the Chinese Govern- 
ment were fully alive to the expediency, or even 
necessity, for their own interests, of facilitating and 
encouraging intercourse with foreign nations; for 
they were sensible of the advantages that would re- 

^ Lord Clarendon's acceptance of Mr. Burlingame's inspiration re- 
ceives another name, of course, from upholders of the Palmerston tradi- 
tion. Here is a typical estimate of this change of policy by one of them: 
it is "the relapse of Great Britain into an efiFeminate, invertebrate, in- 
consequent policy, swayed by every wind from without or within, and 
opposed to the judgment of her own experienced representatives — the 
policy which has beyond doubt led to the decline of British prestige in 
Asia." (A. R. Colquhoun, "China in Transformation," London, 1898, 
p. 221.) 



174 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

suit from a greater assimilation of their rules and 
practice to those of other nations, and from the 
adoption of the improvements by which the industry 
of Europe has been so much developed and the 
happiness of its people so much increased; but that 
with all this they felt that any attempt abruptly to 
introduce new systems or new ideas among a people 
whose knowledge of foreign nations was of recent 
date, and who had been brought up under a tradi- 
tional system, to which they had been accustomed 
and were attached, would not only produce confusion 
and even revolution in the country, but would tend 
to retard instead of promoting the progress, the 
necessity for which the Chinese Government fully 
admitted and were desirous to encourage, though 
they wished to be allowed to do so by degrees, and 
without any sudden and violent shock to the feelings, 
passions, and even prejudices of their people. 

Her Majesty's Government, I informed you in 
reply, fully admitted that the Chinese Government 
were entitled to count upon the forbearance of for- 
eign nations; and I assured you that, as far as their 
country was concerned, there was neither a desire 
nor intention to apply unfriendly pressure to China 
to induce her government to advance more rapidly 
in her intercourse with foreign nations than was con- 
sistent with safety and with due and reasonable re- 
gard for the feelings of her subjects. 

But her Majesty's Government, I said, expected 
from China a faithful observance of the stipulations 
of existing treaties, and reserved to themselves the 
right of employing friendly representations to induce 
the Chinese Government to advance in the course 
opened up by those treaties, and to afford greater 
facilities and encouragement and protection to the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 175 

subjects of foreign powers seeking to extend com- 
mercial intercourse with the Chinese people. 

Her Majesty's Government feel that they may 
fairly appeal to the Chinese Government, though 
always in terms of friendship, to act in this spirit 
toward themselves and other foreign nations; and 
they would do so with the more confidence because 
they may be excused for believing that the interests 
of China will be advanced in a far greater degree 
than those of foreign nations, by steadily availing 
herself of the opportunities within her reach for ap- 
plying to her empire the skill and experience of the 
nations of Europe. 

But her Majesty's Government are, moreover, 
entitled to expect from China as an indispensable 
condition of their goodwill, the fullest amount of 
protection to British subjects resorting to her domin- 
ions. They are aware that the provincial governors 
are too often in the habit of disregarding the rights 
of foreigners, trusting to impunity as regards the 
Central Government of Peking, and to the unwill- 
ingness of foreign powers to assert the rights of their 
subjects by local pressure. 

Her Majesty's Government feel that they are 
acting in the interest of the Chinese Empire when 
they announce their preference rather for an appeal 
to the Central Government than to local authori- 
ties for the redress of wrongs done to British subjects. 
It is with the Central Government and not with the 
provincial authorities that foreign powers have en- 
tered into treaties, and it is for the interest of 
the Central Government that foreign powers should 
recognise its supreme authority over its provincial 
governors, and that the Central Government should 
assume, and, on all occasions when appealed to for 



176 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the redress of local wrongs, be prepared to exercise 
that authority. 

These observations will, I trust, enable you to 
reassure the Government of Peking as to the friendly 
feelings entertained toward it by the British Govern- 
ment. It rests with the Central Government so to 
order its intercourse with Great Britain and the 
Queen's subjects as to avoid cause of difference and 
to preserve unimpaired the friendship of this country. 

I have only to add, that all her Majesty's agents 
in China have been instructed to act in the spirit 
and with the objects which I have thus explained 
to you; and generally to caution British subjects 
to pay due respect not only to the laws of the empire, 
but, as far as may be, to the usages and feelings of 
the Chinese people. 

I am, &c.. 

Clarendon.^ 

In transmitting a copy of this letter to Sir 
Rutherford Alcock at Peking, his lordship in- 
formed him that "her Majesty's Government 
wish the policy indicated in this communication 
to be observed by her Majesty's agents in 
China in their dealings with the Chinese author- 
ities and people, and I have to instruct you to 
give directions to her Majesty's consuls accord- 
ingly, and also as to the general caution to be 
given to British subjects, when occasion may 

1" Parliamentary Papers, China, no. 1 (1869)." "Correspondence Re- 
specting the Relations between Great Britain and China." "Official 
Papers of the Chinese Legation," Berlin, 1870, p. 40. The letter was 
first printed in The Times of February 19, 1869. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 177 

arise, as to their demeanour toward the Chinese; 
although it may not be necessary that they 
should issue any express notification on the sub- 
ject. That point, however, I must leave to your 
discretion." 

It happened — as already described — that 
the disturbances at Yangchow and in Formosa, 
occurring since the departure of the Mission 
from China, had been redressed in the old- 
fashioned way by a display of force on the part 
of British consuls. One of the earliest indica- 
tions of the change in foreign ministers, when ^ , 
Stanley was succeeded by Clarendon, was the '/ 
latter's judgment passed upon the actions of 
these consuls in a letter to the minister^ declar- 
ing that his "communication with Mr. Burlin- 
game rendered it necessary that he should not 
defer making his observations." When the 
specific nature of these criticisms transpired the 
merchant communities at the ports broke forth 
in reprobations the echo of which has hardly 
yet died away. The change in British policy 
seemed to them to bring with it the doom of all 
profitable intercourse with China. It meant the 
summary removal of that mighty leverage by 
which European traders had supported their 
business against Chinese interference and com- 

^ Clarendon to Alcock, January 14, 1869. 



178 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

petition. Their apprehensions were natural. 
They recall the protests of the servants of the 
East India Company against Clive's reforms, in 
1762, of conditions in Bengal that, while more 
brutally oppressive toward the Asiatics, were 
not dissimilar in nature. It is easy to compre- 
hend the attitude of the merchants who regarded 
the proscription of the old plan of coercion for 
redressing grievances and injuries as the with- 
drawal of a vested right, but we must recognise 
that it was the animosity thus engendered 
against Mr. Burlingame's idea which succeeded 
in covering his Mission with a disparagement 
that has never been removed. Here were the 
"Fair-Play" and "Co-operative" policies of the 
closing decade no longer presented in the innocu- 
ous forms of subjects for newspaper discussion, 
but applied to actual commerce with a ven- 
geance. In China as in America the Caucasian 
has ever displayed a fine tolerance in the con- 
templation of lofty ideals when dealing with 
one's own neighbours; but when the purse is 
touched, as it is in the free competition of Chinese 
traders or labourers, idealism gets little reverence. 
Burlingame, the idealist, had aroused the antip- 
^ athy of the moneyed class both in Europe and 
America; his reputation has never yet been entirely 
redeemed from the effects of their execrations. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 179 

So manifest a change in the poHcy of Great 
Britain as that imphed in Lord Clarendon's 
communication to Mr. Burhngame could not 
pass without rigorous criticism on the part of 
those whose business was likely to be affected. 
They at once recognised the document as equiv- 
alent in principle to a formal treaty and, taken 
in connection with the convention then under 
negotiation in Peking, it was not improperly set 
down as an achievement of the Mission hardly 
second in significance to the treaty concluded 
at Washington. The English press discussed the 
matter with too little understanding to render 
an examination of, editorial comments profitable 
at this time, and sufficient notice has already 
been taken of the recalcitrant attitude of the 
foreign merchants in the East and of their dis- 
approval. It is only necessary here to scrutinise 
the arguments of two writers whose views reflect 
the opinion of moderate British conservatism. 
The first of these is contained in an article on 
"Our Policy in China," published at the time 
in the Westminster Review^ by Mr. James Barr 
Robertson; the other is Mr. Alexander Michie's 
chapter on "The Revision of the Treaty," in his 
"Englishman in China," published in 1900. 

According to Mr. Robertson Lord Clarendon's 

1 Vol. 93, p. 180. 



X 



180 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

volte face was precipitate, and founded upon as- 
surances which Mr. Burhngame had no right to 
give. Conscientious foreigners were united in 
denying any spontaneous desire for progress dis- 
cernible in the Chinese Government, but found, 
on the contrary, the old spirit of pride and con- 
ceit to be as dominant as ever. He openly ad- 
mitted that it would be impossible for Europeans 
to stay in China if they ceased to browbeat the 
natives or extended to the empire the full rights 
of international law. To act generously toward 
her would be interpreted as a confession of 
weakness, would ruin the prestige of Great 
Britain and deprive China of her strongest mo- 
tive for attempting progress. No half measures 
satisfied this avowed upholder of the right divine 
of the white man to assume the role of school- 
master among the lesser breeds of the earth. 
"If China will assent to progress and the devel- 
opment of her resources under a system of well- 
considered pressure by the foreign ministers, 
even if its rulers are under fear of armed com- 
pulsion if they refuse, we cannot see that the 
exercise of this pressure in a responsible manner 
by the foreign governments is objectionable. 
Any improvement in China is only possible 
under such a system. We have no desire to be 
unjust or unreasonable toward the Chinese, . . . 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 181 

but we strongly object to any assurance being 
given the Chinese authorities that the time and 
manner of their progress are left to their own 
discretion, and that, therefore, they need no 
longer fear to disregard the demands of the 
British minister at Peking." ''The judgment of 
the Chinese themselves," he continues, "on the 
perils that beset their future course is utterly 
worthless; there is no statesman in that empire 
who contemplates the future except in the light 
of a hoped-for return to ancient customs and 
ancient predominance." 

The fact that Lord Clarendon had made his 
programme contingent upon a faithful observ- 
ance of the treaty by China^ seemed to this 
amiable autocrat a proviso of no worth because 
the state of China forbade any hope that the 
contract wovdd be satisfactorily observed. Pass- 
ing over this non sequitur, we come to one still 
more glaring. The British minister in Peking, 
he thinks, must be authorised to bring about 



^ He explains this carefully to Sir Rutherford in the following words : 
"I requested Mr. Burlingame to bear in mind, and to make known to 
the Chinese Government, that we should henceforward have a right to 
expect on its part the faithful fulfilment of treaty engagements, the 
prompt redress of grievances referred to the Central Government, and 
friendly treatment of British subjects by the Chinese authorities. This, 
I said, was not only just and reasonable in itself, but also necessary in 
order to enable her Majesty's Government to give full effect to the policy 
which they desired to observe toward China, particularly with reference 
to not having recourse to measures of force unless for the immediate 



182 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

hostilities whenever he regards it to be abso- 
hitely necessary. "So long," he argues, "as a 
question or complaint is in the hands of a min- 
ister it is one for negotiation to be settled by 
fh strong language or a gunboa^^; but the moment 
the case is referred to London the question 
becomes international and the honour of the 
British nation demands vindication by an ap- 
peal to arms." It was impossible for a censor 
with such prepossessions to realise that in due 
time direct telegraphic communication with the 
Far East would curtail and practically vitiate 
the sovereign power in which he wished to clothe 
the British envoy, or that a Chinese legation in 
London would presently have its share in effect- 
ing the settlement of disputes. Nor could he 
see that, whatever the friction of changing sys- 
tems and of educating the Chinese Government 
to its new responsibilities, the only safe prin- 
ciple in the conduct of international relations 

protection of life and property. Mr. Burlingame agreed, and promised 
to make a report of my observations to Peking. 

"You will observe in Mr. Burlingame's letter that he clearly under- 
stands that force may be at once employed ' to protect life and property 
immediately exposed.' When, these being secured, the question at 
issue has been referred to Peking to be diplomatically discussed between 
her Majesty's representative and the Central Government, the manner 
in which the matter should thereafter be dealt with, if it could not be 
amicably settled on the spot, would necessarily be left to the decision 
of her Majesty's Government, after hearing the report of her Majesty's 
minister, and full consideration of all the circumstances of the case." 
(Clarendon to Alcock, January 13, 1869.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 183 

was to recognise that government as alone re- 
sponsible. The danger of intrusting such powers 
as he suggests to any diplomatic agent — or any 
human being — was conveniently ignored. "Will 
Mr. Robertson," demands an old resident of 
Shanghai who entertained broader views, "have 
the goodness to tell us where we are to find such 
Heaven-endowed ministers for China. ^^ — men 
capable of being trusted to decide by their own 
fiat whether or not the empires of Great Britain 
and China shall at any moment be irretrievably 
involved in war?" ^ However necessary such 
powers might conceivably be in the anomalous 
period when the two civilisations first met, they 
had already become dangerous and discreditable 
and needed to be replaced by a policy more in 
accord with law and diplomacy, even at the cost 
of some embarrassments in the beginning. As 
one of the beneficiaries of the system which had 
obtained for half a century in China it was as 
difficult for a writer of the Robertson type to 
understand this as it had been for the Southern 
planters in America to comprehend the politi- 
cal and economic arguments advanced against 
slavery before the Civil War. The ulterior 
dangers lurking in the preposterous assumption 
of this school were revealed in a leader in The 

1 J. MacDonald, "The China Question," London, 1870, p. 29. 



/ 



184 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Times which disposes of the opponents of Lord 
Clarendon from no unselfish motive. 

The virtual certainty that this country can com- 
pel the Chinese to yield to any number of such de- 
mands as it pleases to make ought to render its 
oflScers peculiarly rigid to scrutinising the justice of 
claims by their countrymen for vengeance. . . . The 
system of immediately resorting to force to cut the 
knot of any diflSculty was dangerous even when the 
relations of Europe to the central authority in China 
were intermittent. This easy process of proof that 
right was on the side of the foreigner had a tendency 
to induce a demeanour on the part of European 
merchants most unfavourable to the establishment 
of a kindly and natural feeling between them and 
the natives. ... If Great Britain take into her own 
hands the punishment of provincial anarchy or in- 
subordination there, the court of Peking will not 
be at much pains to enforce satisfaction for British 
wrongs which British subjects are thus ready to 
enforce for themselves. Still more, if every official 
of this country assert the right of chastising such < 
offences without communicating either with the 
Chinese or his own government, it must be expected 
that the several officials of other nations equally in- 
terested in Chinese trade will claim the same priv- 
ilege. It is not difficult to see that no country 
would suffer more materially from the establish- 
ment of such a licence than this.^ 

The strictures of Mr. Robertson are chiefly 
interesting as a revelation of the theory of 

^ London Times, January 11, 1869, 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 185 

British "rights" in China commonly accepted 
at that time. His arguments hardly need ref- 
utation now. Those of Mr. Micliie inveigh 
more particularly against the subject of this 
sketch as the source of England's discomfort. 
"Taken textually," he says, "the negotiations 
between Mr. Burlingame and Lord Clarendon 
were of a platonic nature. Her Majesty's Gov- 
ernment undertook to apply no pressure to 
China." ^ As the author of "The Englishman 
in China" was resident at the time of this issue 
in Shanghai and wrote in that work the ablest 
and most authoritative account of British rela- 
tions with China that has thus far appeared in 
print, his charges against the "Burlingame influ- 
ence" require consideration. They consist of 
two counts: that a British Cabinet minister 
should have demeaned his ofiic^ by pronouncing 
judgment upon British representatives at the 
instigation of an American, and that to pledge 
his government to refrain from applying pres- 
sure was "one of those gratuitous acts which all 
diplomatic experience condemns as fraught with 
future embarrassments." 

It will be recognised as eminently character- 
istic of Gladstone's ministry that one of its first 
diplomatic acts should have been not only a 

^ A. Michie. "The Englishman in China," vol. II, p. 209. 



186 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

removal of the '^'Palmerstonian tradition," but 
y a candid confession that England had played 
the bully too long in eastern Asia and now re- 
pented of her past. Though the act was Lord 
Clarendon's, the spirit which prompted the 
communication to Mr. Burlingame was that of 
^ his chief as well. It seems unnecessary, if not 
absurd, to read into this change of policy at the 
beginning of a new administration the demoral- 
ising influence of a foreign adventurer — espe- 
cially when the personal characters of Gladstone 
and Clarendon are remembered. Even if these 
are ignored, unless we are to believe that the 
prime minister had no knowledge of what his 
secretary for foreign affairs was doing, we must 
infer that the new instructions issued to the 
diplomatic and naval officers stationed in China 
were sanctioned by the British cabinet as a 
whole. It ascribes to Mr. Burlingame powers 
hardly short of magical to conclude from his pres- 
ence in London at this juncture that, "adroitly 
seizing on the repression of the Yangchow and 
Formosa outrages as flagrant examples, he suc- 
ceeded in incensing Lord Clarendon against the 
various British officials concerned in these 
troubles, whom his lordship visited with punish- 
ment which scarcely stopped short of vindictive- 
ness." 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 187 

In favour of the second count it might be 
urged that instead of a pledge to the Chinese 
Government the object in view could have been 
obtained by instructing Sir Rutherford to re- 
frain from applying pressure in the ancient and 
accustomed way. Mr. Burlingame probably ap- 
proved a stronger and more public statement 
in order that it might commit the British Gov- 
ernment to the policy for which he and Sir 
Frederick Bruce had stood from the beginning, 
precisely as Secretary Seward had committed 
the American Government in the recent treaty 
to a formal declaration of the inherent right of 
free migration, though the right had been shared 
by all immigrants to America alike. As the 
ambassador of China he very properly desired 
to safeguard her interests, and to this end he 
based his proposal upon a considerable personal 
experience in diplomacy which had taught him 
that instructions dictated by expediency to 
diplomatic officials in the Far East varied in 
their complexion like the phases of the moon 
unless regulated by some authoritative declara- 
tion of policy. The question involved here is 
not, however, Mr. Burlingame's action; what- 
ever his schemes he is acknowledged by his most 
indignant English critics to have succeeded. 
The blame is thrown upon Lord Clarendon for 



188 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

embarrassing his diplomatic agent while nego- 
tiating a treaty revision, and for inspiring the 
Chinese reactionaries with the momentary hope 
that England was about to withdraw the mailed 
fist from the civilising influences she had sent 
among them. He is censured, moreover, for 
thus rendering his agent's negotiations futile, 
because, inspired by this hope, they would not 
concede the changes demanded by foreign mer- 
chants. But this was not the reason for their 
refusal. China was holding her own in an argu- 
ment; before this date she had never been al- 
lowed to really argue the terms of her treaties, 
they had all been won from her by sheer force. 
The English had so accustomed themselves to 
her abject submission in disputes that, having 
proposed an amicable debate in a period of 
peace, they did not know how to play the 
game.^ They expected to secure a number of 

^ By this is meant the commercial English whose objections ultimately 
prevented the ratification of the convention, to the disappointment of 
their government. In commenting upon his completed work. Sir R. 
Alcock writes: "I have both accepted and made concessions of more 
or less importance, keeping in view the material condition of the empire, 
the actual situation of the government, and the true interests of both 
countries. I had already last year announced to Prince Kung that I 
held nothing was to be gained by negotiating for the exclusive advantage 
of either nation to the prejudice of the other; and my conviction that 
the interests of both must be consulted. I am persuaded that on no 
other basis can permanent relations of amity and commerce be main- 
tained. There must be reciprocity of benefits as well as a spirit of fair- 
ness and desire for mutual accord. We may not get all that could be 
desired by strictly adhering to such a policy, nor obtain the most reason- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 189 

sweeping changes, but they were unwilling to 
give anything in return, and when it was found 
that China could not be influenced to her own 
disadvantage, except in the old and costly way 
of war, the merchants deliberately preferred to 
resume the status quo ante conloquium, unsatis- 
factory as they still declared it to be. If there 
was a failure the responsibility was theirs.^ 

The English at home were actually enjoying 
their first opportunity of hearing the cause of 
China publicly advocated by one in authority 
who was not associated with Exeter Hall or anti- 

able concessions even as promptly or as fully as we desire. But such as 
are obtained will be more willingly upheld by the Central Government, 
and therefore less likely to be evaded by the provincial authorities or 
rendered nugatory by indirect means. ... It was not to be expected 
that China, for the first time in a position to negotiate as an independent 
and sovereign state, without preface or coercion would be disposed to 
concede everything and ask for nothing in return, or that the Chinese 
Government would not desire to avail themselves of the opportunity 
afforded by a revision to secure some modification of the terms which 
were originally imposed upon them without any choice on their part." 
("Parliamentary Papers, China, no. 1 (1870)." Alcock to Baron Rehfues, 
October 20, 1869.) 

1 The main source for opinions of foreigners in China about the treaty 
revision of 1869 is the weekly North China Herald, published in Shanghai. 
The documentary material is contained in the "Parliamentary Papers: 
China, nos. 1 and 12 (1869)," and "nos. 1, 4, and 5 (1870) "; "Memorials 
Addressed to His Excellency the British Minister at Peking on the 
Approaching Revision of the Treaty of Tientsin," Shanghai, 1868; 
"Memorials on the Revision of the Treaty of Tientsin Forwarded to the 
Governments of Great Britain and the United States by Private Resi- 
dents in China," Shanghai, 1869; "The Revision of the British Treaty 
with China. A Letter from the United States Consul at Shanghai [Geo. 
F. Seward] to the Secretary of State," Shanghai, 1869. The subject 
receives most impartial consideration in A. J. Sargent's " Anglo-Chinese 
Commerce and Diplomacy," Oxford, 1907; Robertson's Westminster 
article, and Michie's "Englishman in China," have been cited in the 



190 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

opium tirades. The experience was a severe 
one to the nerves of their countrymen who had 
gone out to the Far East to amass fortunes upon 
the favourable conditions now incontinently 
threatened. The London press was at first, as 
already indicated, indifferent to Chinese politics. 
After the publication (January 4, 1869) of Lord 
Clarendon's instructions to British consuls in 
China to regard not only its laws but the usages 
and feelings of the people, it discovered the im- 
portance of these affairs. The Times, Pall Mall 
Gazette, and Morning Star began to speak sym- 
pathetically of China, and The Daily News and 
Spectator cautiously followed in the same strain, 
while individuals were found who ventured so 
far in plain language as to describe the model 
settlement of Shanghai, the cynosure of foreign- 
ers in eastern Asia, as "a sink of iniquity." ^ 

text; A. R. Colquhoun's "China in Transformation," chap. VIII, is a 
mere echo of Michie's views, though published before the latter's book 
appeared. 

It may be added that Sir Rutherford Alcock and Mr. Medhurst did 
not themselves believe that they were — to quote Mr. Michie's words 
— "discredited, stultified, and rendered powerless to effect the objects 
for which they had been labouring." 

1 An expression of the Duke of Somerset on the floor of the House of 
Lords. He also impartially denounced the missionaries as "rogues and 
enthusiasts." The editor of the North China Herald laments that "we 
have the disheartening conviction that we are not only misrepresented 
and misunderstood, but refused an opportunity of justifying ourselves, 
while the feeblest twaddle in support of the popular view finds ready 
publicity" (January 1, 1870). The Protestant missionaries in China 
warmly seconded the policy of peaceful action and reference to Peking, 
but the commercial bodies at the treaty ports, having control of the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 191 

newly established cables in Asia, coloured news telegrams with their anti- 
Chinese prejudices with considerable effect. The Tory newspapers in 
England made the most of these telegrams. "Ces organes," writes 
Felix Aucaigne, in La Patrie (September 1, 1869), "ne laissent passer 
aucune occasion de frapper sur tout ce qui touche directement ou in- 
directement a I'Amerique. Et ensuite ils s'etonnent que la grande 
nation du Nouveau-Monde soit si chatouilleuse, comme elle I'a prouve 
pour I'affaire de 1' Alabama. Si nous osions donner un conseil a cette 
fraction de la presse britannique, nous lui dirons que c'est precisement 
en agissant ainsi qu'on ne ramenera pas la bonne entente entre I'Angle- 
terre et I'Amerique, et qu'on tiendra toujours suspendue sur la tete de la 
Grande-Bretagne la menace d'une guerre effroyable avec les Etats-Unis." 




THE OPPOSITION IN CHINA 

NE man's inventive originality, impelled 
by no vanity or ambition but by the 
stress of an outward appeal to his 
humanity, had within the first year of his as- 
sumption of a great task won the consent of 
his countrymen to place China upon the same 
footing as other nations, and induced England 
publicly to caution her agents there to refrain 
from aggressive acts at the expense of Chinese 
authority in the empire. He had touched the 
pride and aroused the ideals of America, where 
the materialism of a democratic people has 
always been imbued with a certain capacity for 
abstract conceptions of righteousness that pro- 
foundly influences their policy. Though this 
sentiment soon clashed with the supposed in- 
terests of workingmen in the United States, and 
was extinguished for a time by narrow mercenary 
considerations, it reappeared in the crisis of 
China's recent career when Secretary Hay, in 
1900, renewed Mr. Burlingame's appeal to the 
conscience of his countrymen, and America once 
more stood for a policy of fair play. As to 

192 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 193 

Great Britain, a hand-to-mouth arrangement 
begun in the days of the East India Company 
at Canton had been perpetuated by the cupidity 
of her traders in China under the plea that ob- 
durate mandarins made it necessary to maintain 
a precarious foothold there by intimidating the 
natives. Thus a handful of Englishmen in that 
country, who were accounted experts in deal- 
ing with Asiatics, but who were generally igno- 
rant of the language and genius of the people, 
dictated the course of England's relations with 
one of the great divisions of mankind. If Mr. 
Burlingame was only partially successful in 
checking a procedure to which long custom had 
given sanction, his failure may be attributed to 
the removal of his personal influence before his 
work of directing the Mission was accomplished, 
and to the strength and cohesion of the forces 
arrayed against him. Yet much had been really 
achieved. While the plan of the liberal minis- 
try of 1868 languished in the reaction which fol- 
lowed the series of riots subsequent to 1870 in 
China, Great Britain never officially counte- 
nanced a renewal of the Palmerston tradition; 
and in the emergency of the boxer madness she 
joined America to save her national existence. 

On the first day of the new year Mr. Burlin- 
game acknowledged the receipt of Lord Claren- 



194 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

don's dispatch, expressing his conviction that 
"this pohcy acted upon, will make wars with 
China impossible, or they will not occur without 
sufficient cause, and only after mature delibera- 
tion." The same day he transferred the Mission 
to Paris. The French empire had less sympathy, 
perhaps, with projects for maintaining the in- 
tegrity of China than any state in Europe at 
that time, but pressing problems at home made 
it willing to follow the lead of Great Britain in 
matters of general intercourse. In reply to his 
indorsement of the Chinese Mission through the 
British ambassador at Paris, that gentleman 
was able to write the Earl of Clarendon, on 
January 5, that "the Marquis de Lavalette 
begged me to convey his thanks to your lord- 
ship, and expressed in general terms the dis- 
position of the government of the Emperor to 
act in this, as in other matters, in accordance 
with her Majesty's Government." Napoleon III 
could not well refuse to receive the Mission 
after his esteemed ally Queen Victoria had given 
it audience, and the same precedent seems to 
have been accepted as valid in bringing other 
European courts to a similar conclusion. M. de 
Lavalette, in response to Mr. Burlingame's re- 
quest for an opportunity to present his creden- 
tials to the Emperor, expresses the determina- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 195 

tion of his sovereign to demand similar courtesy 
from the Son of Heaven, but, Hke Secretary 
Seward, admits his minority as sufficient ex- 
cuse for delay in insisting upon the right at 
present : 

En votre qualite d'ancien agent diplomatique, vous 
savez aussi bien que personne, Monsieur, que la 
forme de reception d'agents diplomatiques se regie 
suivant la reciprocite. C'est a raison de la minorite 
du Souverain du Celeste Empire que le cabinet 
frangais n'a point insiste pour que les mains de 
I'Empereur de la Chine, et que sa Majeste Napoleon 
III recevra directement aujourd'hui vos lettres de 
creance, bien que la meme etiquette n'ait pas suivie 
jusqu'ici pour les envoyes frangais a Peking. Je 
vous prie de vouloir bien transmettre cette observa- 
tion prejudicielle a votre gouvernement. . . .^ 

The address of the envoy upon delivering his 
credentials in the Tuileries, January 21, briefly 

^ H. Cordier, "Histoire des relations de la Chine avec les puissances 
occidentales," I, Paris, 1901, p. 300. M. Cordier insists that Mr. Bur- 
lingame was only granted solemn audience with the various sovereigns 
of Europe because he concealed the conditions of his appointment. 
This did not transpire, he says, until in reply to a request from the for- 
eign envoys in Peking for an audience in the palace the French 
charge received the following from Prince Kung (September 19, 18G9) : 
"Before the departure of Burlingame we respectfully asked instruc- 
tions (from the Emperor) which we received to the following effect: 
Upon the arrival of Burlingame in a country the credentials which he 
carries should be confided to the intermediary of the proper ministers, 
without his needing to insist upon placing them in their own hands. 
If a country (a sovereign), considering Burlingame as an Occidental, 
wishes in accordance with the customs of the Occident to treat him with 
the highest respect, Burlingame should declare beforehand, to the end 



196 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

explained the object of his mission as **the ex- 
pression of a sincere desire on the part of China 
to enter into the family of nations, to submit her 
questions, as you submit your questions, to the 
enlightened judgment of mankind, and to avail 
herself of the privileges while she is called upon 
to accept the obligations of international law. 
This desire was the outgrowth of a better appre- 
ciation of the civilisation of the West resulting 
from a considerate policy established and main- 
tained by the representatives of the treaty 
powers on coming into more immediate rela- 
tions with great men of the empire at Peking. 
That policy was the substitution of fair diplo- 
matic action for the caprice of interest and the 
rude energy of force." ^ 

that it may not be supposed in the issue that China does not know how 
to recognise such proceedings, that the Chinese ceremonial is not the 
same as that of the West." It is difBcult to discover in this communica- 
tion any basis for the allegation. Mr. Burlingame had no need to explain 
to European courts the well-known fact that the Chinese Emperor had 
as yet declined all overtures for audience with the representatives of 
foreign powers. They received him in the hope that an audience with 
the first accredited envoy from China might establish a precedent that 
would be useful when the matter was again argued in Peking, but in 
being received "as an Occidental" he made no promises, and committed 
that sovereign to nothing. On Chung-how's arrival in France in Novem- 
ber, 1871, on his mission of apology, M. Thiers at first refused to receive 
him personally, because Mr. Burlingame's audience with the Emperor 
had not been accepted as a precedent for conceding a similar ceremony 
to the French minister by the court in Peking, but the point was not 
pressed. 

1 "Official Papers of the Chinese Legation," p. 47. The reply of the 
Emperor, which was formal and perfunctory, does not appear to have 
been preserved. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 197 

During a stay of six months in Paris the Mis- 
sion, though entertained sociably and freely in- 
troduced to the varied delights of the gay capital, 
failed to inspire the French Government with 
any inclination to negotiate an amendment of 
its treaty with China. The French attitude 
upon this matter was not unexpected. No such 
problems of emigration and commerce as those 
which stirred American and British subjects 
in the East concerned the ministers of Louis 
Napoleon. Their main interest, larger liberties X 
for Catholic missionaries, could be more ad- 
vantageously furthered through their minister 
in Peking under the inspiration of the mission- 
aries themselves. The unexpected delay of the 
Tsung-li Yamen in ratifying his Washington 
treaty began to embarrass Mr. Burlingame's 
diplomatic activities by disposing European 
statesmen to await a report of his indorsement 
by the Chinese Government before attaching to 
his Mission the significance it merited. 

This delay in receiving a confirmation of his 
action in America renders it necessary to revert 
to the situation in China, which was so changing 
as to cause apprehension. For some unexplained 
reason a long time seems to have elapsed before 
the text of the treaty reached Peking. In his 
first interview at the Tsung-li Yamen, November 



198 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

18, 1868, Mr. J. Ross Browne reports Prince 
Kung as explaining that the Mission had been 
sent first to America because Mr. Burlingame 
was an American, — not from any political pref- 
erence, — to which announcement he added, 
with a trace of humour, that *' all the information 
received so far was, that their time was so much 
occupied in visiting and sight-seeing that it was 
impossible to find leisure enough to write ofiicial 
dispatches." A few days later the minister 
"sees no reason to doubt that these additional 
articles [to the Tientsin treaty] will be ratified 
by the Chinese Government; and I feel bound 
to recognise and carry into effect, as far as prac- 
ticable, the policy distinctly avowed in the 2d 
and 8th articles, as well as the general spirit of 
the treaty. How far this may be reconcilable 
with the efforts of the British minister to enlarge 
the scope of foreign intercourse by insisting upon 
a more liberal interpretation of the British treaty 
now under revision than has hitherto been given 
to it by the Chinese Government is a question 
which opens up the whole subject of foreign 
policy in this country and the circumstances 
upon which it was founded." To this Mr. 
Browne, who was rapidly forming his opinions 
under the influence of European laymen and 
their newspapers at the ports, adds the amazing 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 199 

statement that "the difference between the laws, 
customs, and reHgion of China and those of 
Christian nations is so radical as to preclude 
intercourse upon equal terms." ^ 

For reasons of his own the new American min- 
ister appears to have developed a pessimism 
sharply contrasted with the Burlingame view of 
the international situation. He came to his post 
with exaggerated ideas of China's friendly feel- 
ing toward his country, and was prepared to 
look for proofs of that friendship in important 
concessions to his countrymen. "These antici- 
pations," he confesses sadly, "are without 
foundation. The Government of China may 
have preferences; but it has no special regard 
for any foreign power. The dominant feeling 
is antipathy and distrust toward all who have 
come in to disturb the administration of its 
domestic affairs. But little difference is recog- 
nised between one power and another. The 
concessions obtained by force of arms have been 
accepted by all." Despite his disappointment, 
however, he strongly advocated a continuance 
of the co-operative policy among foreign powers 
to preserve their harmony of action. "I think 
it essential to the maintenance of friendly rela- 

^ United States Department of State, " China," vol. 25. Browne to 
Seward, nos. 4 and 7, November 20 and 25. 



200 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

tions," he writes, "that there should be a, per- 
fect understanding of the difficulties involved in 
the antagonistic civilisations of the West and 
this empire. Too sanguine a representation of 
the intelligence of the Chinese and their ability, 
statesmanship, and desire to advance has a tend- 
ency to create exciting delusions and can only 
result in disappointment to us and injury to 
them." ^ 

It was not until March 20 that Mr. Browne 
announced the arrival of the additional articles 
to the treaty of Tientsin. Then, after a strangely 
long delay, he encloses, on June 4, Prince Kung's 
reply of March 12 to his suggestion to proceed 
with the exchange of ratifications: 

Prince Kung, chief secretary of state, herewith 
sends a reply : I have had the honour to receive your 
excellency's dispatch of the 6th inst., wherein you 
inform me that the Honourable W. H. Seward, on 
behalf of the United States, and the Honourable 
Anson Burlingame, Chi Kang and Sun Chia-ku, on 
the part of China, have negotiated a treaty in eight 
articles; which the former having made known to 
the President, it has received his signature and the 
seal of the United States, and was then forwarded 
to China; and further, that having been specially 
appointed commissioner to exchange the ratification 
of this treaty, your excellency wishes me to report 
it to the Throne in order that an official of similar 

^ Ibid., Browne to Seward, December 5, 1868. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 201 

rank may be appointed and a date fixed for exchang- 
ing them with you. 

In relation to this matter I have to reply that it 
seems to be advisable to defer the exchange of these 
ratifications until the return of the Chinese plenipo- 
tentiaries, when the purport of the articles can be 
fully discussed. His Majesty's rescript can then be 
obtained, and the exchange made in accordance 
with your proposition, for there are reasons which 
make it rather difficult to effect the exchange at this 
time. I make this statement having reference to 
the particulars stated in your dispatch, for your 
information. 

The minister's comments upon this communi- 
cation suflSciently resolve the motives that in- 
duced the Chinese Government to postpone 
action. "I am disinclined," he says, "to infer 
any slight to our government from this delay, 
or any want of friendship as shown in the tenor 
of the new articles, on the part of the Chinese 
rulers. The absence of both time and place in 
the text shows that no special importance was 
attached to this point; and I think the true 
cause of the delay may be found in the peculiar 
attitude of the Chinese toward all the treaty 
powers. Experience has taught the rulers to be 
cautious how they agree to anything with one 
nation which may entangle them with the others, 
or the full bearings of which they cannot clearly 
comprehend. . . . Under the circumstances I 



202 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

have not thought it expedient to press an imme- 
diate exchange of ratifications. . . . When the 
Government of China is satisfied that it will not 
be injurious to its interests to accept these 
articles it will do so; and that, it seems to me, 
is all a friendly power could desire." ^ 

So far, though Mr. Browne's dispatches show 
an indifference to pressing the formalities which 
would render the new treaty operative, they 
indicate no active hostility to the Burlingame 
policy. Before the end of the month, however, 
he wrote to the department two dispatches, re- 
vealing a prepossession in favour of the aggres- 
sive portion of the foreign community in China, 
that are remarkable enough to deserve quota- 
tion.^ In these he intimates that those hetes 
noires of the port merchants, the treaty and Lord 
Clarendon's letter, will render the continuance 
of friendly relations with China impracticable; 
that restrictions on commerce and outrages com- 
mitted on missionaries will soon call for war; 
that whatever may be said of the tendency of 
progressive foreigners in China to seek their own 
ends irrespective of the rights of others, "I feel 
entirely confident that they will gain their points 
in the long run"; and in the end he concludes 

1 lUd., Browne to Fish, June 4, 1869. 

^ Quoted in Appendix III from United States Department of State, 
"China," vol. 26, nos. 47 and 51. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 203 

that the Chinese Government may well consult 
its own interests by a more liberal policy toward 
the merchants, or the latter may get their re- 
venge by assisting in some wild scheme of aggres- 
sion that might overthrow the dynasty. As to 
the new treaty, he maintains that the clause en- 
joining liberty of conscience cannot be enforced 
because it involves intervention in the domestic 
affairs of the empire, while that giving natural- 
ised Chinese the privileges of Americans in 
China would involve the subversion of the Em- 
peror's sovereign authority. Therefore, in his 
opinion, the United States Government ought 
to withdraw its assent to such provisions even 
if the Chinese Government would consent to 
ratify them. It will be remembered, of course, 
by any careful reader that the right of natural- 
isation is expressly withheld from Chinese by 
Article VI of the treaty. 

The causes of this reversal of Mr. Browne's 
opinions and his insistence in urging a reaction- 
ary policy upon his government do not concern 
us here. It may be guessed that they had 
something to do with his temperament and with 
the disappointment of a man unfitted for his 
work when he discovered how little he could 
profit either in pay or reputation from the posi- 
tion of a United States minister in Peking. The 



204 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

man himself need not occupy us, but the effect 
of his conversion to the side of the recalcitrants, 
coupled with the gradual increase of a reaction- 
ary sentiment against foreigners amongst the 
Chinese, gravely menaced the work of the Mis- 
sion. Mr. Browne, upon learning about this 
time through a press telegram of the appoint- 
ment of Mr. William Alanson Howard,^ of 
Michigan, to Peking, instantly resigned his post 
and repaired early in July to Shanghai, leaving 
the legation once more in the hands of Mr. 
Williams in the following note written shortly 
before sailing for San Francisco: 

Shanghai, July 20, 1869. 
Sir: Deeming the appointment of a new minister 
to China a disapproval of my course as diplomatic 
representative of the United States at Peking, I 
cannot consistently with my sense of propriety, 
consent to discharge any longer the duties of the 
position. Differing as I do from my predecessor on 
some of the most essential points of the policy laid 
down by him and accepted by the Government of 
the United States, I feel that my continuance in 
office, even during the brief period intervening be- 
fore the arrival of my successor, might embarrass 
the President in his efforts to carry this policy into 
effect; I therefore request that you will assume the 
duties of Charge d'Affaires from this date. ^ 

^ Afterward Governor of Dakota Territory. 

"United States Department of State, "China," vol. 26, no. 55. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 205 

The action was somewhat precipitate, as Mr. 
Howard shortly afterward dechned the nomi- 
nation. His appointment seems to have been 
prompted by the administration's desire to be 
represented in China by a man of its own choos- 
ing, for it had not, thus far at least, intimated 
disapproval of Mr. Browne's conduct. So sud- 
den a move on the part of a diplomatist was, of 
course, given its own interpretation by the press 
both at home and in China, and every effort 
was made to ascribe it to the Burlingame influ- 
ence, which was supposed to have obsessed the 
American Government.^ While in Shanghai the 
departing minister annotated with some elabo- 
ration a "Note on Chinese Matters," which Mr. 
Robert Hart had been requested to write on the 
Burlingame Mission and China's attitude to- 
ward foreigners. This document is of such an 
authoritative nature and so wise in its appre- 
ciation of the abounding difficulties involved in 

^ The Shanghai correspondent of the London Times reports on July 15 
that according to the American papers "Browne is said to be recalled 
because the President is not pleased with the tone of his official dispatches 
about the Chinese and the Mission of Mr. Burlingame." This, he com- 
plains, "exactly illustrates the difference of opinion which exists between 
all foreigners in China and their governments at home in regard to this 
question. The latter have been persuaded by Burlingame. ... I 
believe, with most other men who have followed Mr. Burlingame's 
career, that no one is more astounded at the ready acceptance his views 
have met than that gentleman himself. . . . But the success of the 
Mission has surprised as much as it has delighted the Peking cabinet. 
It has elated them from a condition of passive to one of active objectivity 
[sic].'' {Times, London, September 7, 1869.) 



206 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the closer contact of East and West as to call 
for quotation in extensu in an appendix. The 
opinions expressed in this temperate statement 
have nearly all been substantiated in the course 
of time. Mr. Browne's notes oppugn these ideas 
and are in striking contrast to his views published 
on leaving California a few months before. At 
this time also the American and British mer- 
chants of Shanghai took the unusual step of 
presenting the retiring minister with addresses, 
thanking him for his "opposition to the shining- 
cross nonsense" — a point of view upon which 
(in the opinion of the Overland China Maiiy 
"her Majesty's minister, that of the United 
States, the residents of both those and all other 
nationalities, the local journals, no matter how 
differing in other matters, the missionaries, na- 
val and military officers, professional men, and, 
lastly, the majority employed in the service of 
the Chinese Government itself, are fully agreed ! " 
Mr. Browne's reply to these merchants w^as 
the ablest paper he wrote in China. In it are 
contained all the arguments that could be rea- 
sonably advanced against a policy of tolerance 
and patience. While accepting the obvious 
premise that justice in dealing with China can- 
not be too highly commended, he insists that 

1 August 5, 1869. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 207 

the irreconcilable difference between pagan and 
Christian nations renders it necessary to inter- 
pret justice in terms of the "superior" or Chris- 
tian states; consequently, "the superior cannot 
enter upon a course of retrogression to adapt it- 
self to the inferior; and if any relations at all 
exist, they must exist upon such equitable terms 
as the stronger may elect to adopt." The exist- 
ing treaties having extorted from China the 
conditions upon which foreigners live there, the 
anomaly is presented of nations holding forcible 
intercourse with a people, yet professing to re- 
spect their prejudices and abstain from inter- 
ference in the administration of their internal 
affairs. "I think," he concludes on this point, 
" our duty is plain. We should do the best that 
can be done under the circumstances, treat China 
with forbearance, consideration, and respect due 
to a power sovereign in its political aspect, but 
possessing an organisation incompatible with 
absolute equality. Believing our civilisation to 
be superior to theirs, we should endeavour to 
elevate the Chinese to our standard. But, 
surely, that can never be done by an unqualified 
acceptance of their claim to the independence 
enjoyed by Christian states. They do not pos- 
sess it in point of fact, and there is no wisdom 
in proceeding upon false premises." From this 



208 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

he argues that it is not good pohcy to proclaim 
solemnly that we will not interfere with the in- 
ternal affairs of the empire when our very pres- 
ence is an interference. The Central Govern- 
ment cannot preserve order or check corruption 
without the introduction of modern improve- 
ments. It has not thus far shown signs of 
wishing to do so, and probably never will of its 
own accord. On the contrary, "the fact that, 
since the Imperial Government received the first 
intelligence of the successful operations of its 
Embassy it has been more determined than ever 
to resist all experiment in the line of progress, 
certainly gives us no encouragement to the hope 
that any change is contemplated." 

Proof of this retrogressive spirit is found in 
the various disturbances and assaults upon for- 
eigners in China during the preceding year — 
the effect of which upon the minds of Europeans 
there, it may be observed, was greater forty 
years ago than in these days when they are ac- 
customed to them and understand better their 
complex causes. To Mr. Browne they seemed 
to be due to a malign government. "It is sim- 
ply pandering to the bigotry and self-conceit of 
the Chinese rulers to treat them, under all cir- 
cumstances and without any reservation, as in- 
dependent and intelligent beings." His main 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 209 

objection to the course pursued now under such 
outrages "is that so good an opportunity was 
lost of demonstrating beyond question the utter 
inefficiency of the pohcy declared both by the 
Government of the United States and that of 
Great Britain." After a brief review of the his- 
tory of intercourse in the past, from which he 
finds that the Chinese authorities have yielded 
nothing to forbearance or persuasion, the writer 
proceeds to relegate the Burlingame Mission to 
the category of frauds which they have per- 
petrated upon indulgent foreigners: "In the 
United States, the sending forth by China of an 
Embassy to treat with the Western powers was 
hailed as one of the grandest movements of 
modern times. Sensible of the importance of 
encouraging foreign intercourse, China, it was 
alleged, had now of her own accord abandoned 
her policy of exclusion and entered upon a career 
of improvement. She did not wait to be pressed, 
but took the initiative. All she desired was fair 
treatment and time to adapt herself to the new 
order of things. A proposition so reasonable as 
this, and so accordant with the generous senti- 
ment of the Western world, could not fail to be 
received with favour. It was what everybody 
desired, and was considered, in America, as fur- 
nishing gratifying evidence, not only of the pro- 



210 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

gressive spirit of the age, but of our influence in 
China. The movement, however, was not in- 
digenous; nor does its object yet seem to be 
thoroughly understood. It is quite clear to my 
mind that it was not intended by the Chinese 
as a progressive movement. . . . What the im- 
perial authorities wanted, in reality, was to 
arrest progress, into which they found themselves 
drifting by the sheer force of circumstances." 
Nevertheless, after speculating upon the causes 
which induced the astute mandarins to this ven- 
ture, Mr. Browne is inclined to expect from it 
results favourable to the cause of progress, de- 
spite their wishes to the contrary. "The Em- 
bassy to the West has been received in a manner 
creditable to the generous spirit of the age. 
Whatever errors may be committed through 
misconception of facts or excess of zeal, the cause 
is one which appeals to the highest sentiments of 
the Christian world; and truth will ultimately 
be eliminated. The stubborn logic of results 
will dissipate all illusions. I look upon the 
movement, therefore, whatever its design may 
have been, as abounding in promise for the 
future. But it is the characteristic of an en- 
thusiastic and progressive race to overleap all 
obstacles and seize upon the conclusions which 
they may desire. This, I fear, will meet with 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 211 

many disheartening checks before the end really 
desired by the nations of the West is attained. 
China neither sees her way clear at present to an 
acceptance of the ameliorations proposed, nor 
has she, so far as facts warrant us in believing, 
the slightest desire to substitute foreign systems 
for those which have answered her purpose 
through so many successive generations." ^ 

The arguments advanced in this dsedalian 
defence of Mr. Browne's attitude opposing the 
avowed policy of his government in its relations 
with China do not call for examination here. 
They rested upon two misconceptions, one of 
principle, the other of fact, upon which his gov- 
ernment was more wisely directed than he. The 
principle that a "Pagan" state could have no 
rights which a Christian community was bound 
to respect, and that, instead of placing inter- 
course upon a basis of justice and integrity, a 
profitable trading relationship could only be 
insured by coercion, was one against which Mr. 

1 "Addresses Presented by the English and American Communities of 
Shanghai to the Hon. J. Ross Browne, and His Excellency's Reply," 
Shanghai, 1869. Mr. Browne had occasion after reaching America to 
repent his rather hasty action in leaving his post. In an "unofficial" 
note to Secretary Fish, enclosing newspaper clippings upon the subject 
of his resignation, he writes: "I beg to disclaim any responsibility for 
the opinions expressed in regard to the appointment by the President of 
Mr. Howard. Should the President desire me to return to China I will 
do so; and this is all I have to say on the subject." (United States De- 
partment of State, "China," vol. 26.) But by this time the department 
had received his dispatches of the 23d and 30th of June. 



212 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Burlingame had long contended and for which 
the United States had pubhcly expressed dis- 
approval. The fact he ignored was an element 
of almost equal importance; for he treated the 
Chinese Government as a perfectly co-ordinated 
unit, and failed to appreciate the existence of 
two contending factions within it, one of which 
was endeavouring against great odds to bring 
the other to realise the imperative necessity of 
reform and a friendly acceptance of the assis- 
tance offered by Western powers to acquaint 
them with methods that might lead to their re- 
habilitation as a powerful nation. To bully the 
government was merely to render this enlight- 
ened minority helpless, and throw the entire 
control of Chinese policy into the hands of 
the reactionary majority. The retiring minister 
read into the acts of the Chinese officials his 
own interpretation based upon a few months' 
residence in China. He was ignorant of her in- 
stitutions and of conditions which varied with 
every section of the interior. So indeed, it may 
be granted, were most foreigners at that time; 
but the difference between the stand-point of a 
Burlingame and a Browne was fundamental: 
While each was misled in some particulars, that 
of the constructive idealist was based upon prin- 
ciples of humanity and equity, that of his de- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 213 

structive critic upon the alleged ethical superi- 
ority of dominant and material force. 

Mr. Browne's attitude toward the Chinese 
Government during his residence in Peking had 
been that of an ordained mentor doing his best 
to urge the authorities into the path of progress 
and intimating to them the dangers that lay in 
any other course. In the endeavour to assist 
the British negotiations he wrote Prince Kung 
a dispatch^ reminding his Imperial Highness 
that now was the appointed time for China to 
meet the wishes of the world: "It is earnestly to 
be hoped that the Government of China will 
not permit so favourable an opportunity to pass 
without placing upon record a substantial guar- 
antee of its disposition to make a forward move- 
ment. Future misunderstanding may be pre- 
vented by a distinct declaration of policy at 
this time." And, in conclusion, this school- 
master abroad among the heathen declares it to 
be his conviction that "steam on the navigable 
waters, the proper working of coal-mines, resi- 
dence and all the rights of trade in the interior, 
and the gradual establishment of telegraphs 
and railroad systems are essential measures of 
modern intercourse, and that some earnest of 

^ Browne to Prince Kung, November 23, 1868. Reprinted in the 
"Addresses" quoted above, and in "United States Foreign Relations," 
1870, p. 316. 



214 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

beginning, without unnecessary delay, would 
avert much future misunderstanding." 

The Tsung-li Yamen had, as already noted, 
no intention of contravening its envoy abroad, 
but after this exhibition of eagerness on the part 
of his successor in the American legation, it 
would not have been strange if Prince Kung had 
taken fright at the prospect of Yankee hector- 
ing and declined to accept the new treaty. An 
editorial in the New York Tribune, in Horace 
Greeley's characteristic style, supplies the spice 
of epithet that seems due to this diplomatic 
essay: "Mr. Ross Browne's significant intima- 
tion to Prince Kung, that if he really had any 
good liberal reforms in course of preparation he 
had better trot them out quickly lest worse 
should come of it, was not a happy mode of 
inspiring a timid, jealous, exclusive, and often- 
deceived nation with confidence in the objects 
and the good faith of the American Government. 
Still more unfortunate was the reply to the ad- 
dresses of the English and American merchants 
at Shanghai. If there is any class of evil counf 
sellors whom an American or an English min- 
ister in China ought especially to avoid, it is 
that cluster and colony of British traders who 
have squatted in the open ports of China. If 
there is any policy which a representative of the 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 215 

United States ought to reject alike from instinct 
and conviction, it is the pohcy which these men 
invariably recommend. It would be impossi- 
ble to exaggerate the evils which have sprung 
from the influence of this class of persons over 
the Chinese policy of England. They are essen- 
tially narrow-minded, selfish, and grasping; for 
them the whole raison d'etre of China and its 
vast population is limited to the advancement 
of the trade they desire to push. Too often 
and too long did English statesmen give way to 
the audacious importunity of men of whom, as 
Burke said of a class not dissimilar, that 'their 
ledger's their Bible, their desk their altar, their 
counting-house their temple, and their money 
their God.' Of late English ministers have 
come into power who will not lend the arms or 
the money of England to force the principles 
and the trade of this class of persons down the 
throats of the Chinese people; and it may be 
out of sheer despair of any assistance or coun- 
tenance from their own government that the 
British merchants recently sought consolation 
and support from the American minister. Mr. 
Ross Browne unluckily threw himself into the 
spirit of the thing. He laid down a doctrine of 
which charity compels us to suppose that he 
did not clearly understand the meaning. He 



216 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

proclaimed the principle that Christian states 
are not bound to respect the independence of 
pagan states, and that civilised people are justi- 
fied, by virtue of their civilisation, in insisting 
on any alteration they please to ask in the 
domestic policy of states less civilised." 

Public opinion in England, as represented by 
The Times, showed no disposition to wince at 
Mr. Browne's denouncement of the Clarendon 
policy. A leader in that journal ^ dismisses good- 
naturedly and a little contemptuously that gentle- 
man's thesis, that equality in the intercourse be- 
tween China and the West was impossible, as 
his private sentiments uttered with the frank- 
ness of an. American citizen. Personal opinions 
on such a matter, so long as one is not spokesman 
for a government, carry no weight but their own 
reasonableness. "It is hard to follow (continues 
that paper) the reasoning by which he seems to 
have persuaded himself that a desire on the part 
of Prince Kung's government to establish direct 
and equal relations with the powers which exer- 
cise so material an influence over its fortunes 
can indicate an aversion in China from progress. 
We ourselves believe that a policy of equality 
is for the honour and interests of China and the 
West alike. We are as convinced as Mr. Browne 

1 September 2, 1869. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 217 

can be of the danger to peace itself of anything 
Hke a yielding attitude in the Western powers; 
but we are at a loss to conceive how to impose 
on the government of a country the responsi- 
bility of making good its engagements, instead 
of taking on ourselves the burden of forcing its 
subjects to respect our treaty rights, can be 
confounded with want of spirit and resolution." 
So far as assurance of British support of the 
Mission was concerned the leader leaves nothing 
to be desired. Rumours of the refusal of China 
to ratify its treaty were authoritatively denied. 
Such a refusal would have been a calamity, 
whether the repudiated treaty had been with 
Great Britain or the United States; for, "it 
does not matter what the particular power is 
for whose immediate advantage Mr. Burlingame 
may be at the moment negotiating; the nego- 
tiation has in any case the same general effect 
of bringing the Chinese Empire out of its isola- 
tion. The great point is that the Chinese Em- 
pire should recognise its capability for being, 
as it were, impersonated in a Mission, and thus 
represented at foreign courts and bound by 
agreements concluded by its representatives in 
its own name." 

The succes d'estime of the Mission abroad had 
indeed encouraged the reactionary element in 



218 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

China to renewed exertions. There was truth 
in the allegation that the favourable impression 
it created in Europe had encouraged the conser- 
vatives to adopt that very retrograde policy 
which it had been one of the primary objects of 
the undertaking to deny before all the world. 
Circumscribed as it was by custom and tradi- 
tion, the government was compelled to yield 
something to a mutinous opposition and refrain 
from advising the Empresses to ratify the Bur- 
lingame treaty promptly, or concede any impor- 
tant favours to Sir Rutherford Alcock's negoti- 
ation. It was, however, a reaction which might 
be esteemed as actually wholesome for China, 
in showing foreigners how far her educated 
men were from accepting the premises upon 
which the too eager advocates of progress based 
their arguments. For China, in the words of a 
British consul, "was by no means ripe for an 
instantaneous reception throughout her entire 
territory of the highly advanced civilisation to 
which we and other Western peoples have be- 
come accustomed. There is abundant material 
to work upon, and that of the most plastic 
character, only it needs to be approached with 
caution and worked with discretion." ^ 

The author of the introductory remarks pref- 

^ Medhurst, "The Foreigner in Far Cathay," p. 184. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 219 

aced to a little work entitled "The Tientsin 
Massacre, being Documents Published in the 
Shanghai Evening Courier"' (probably by the edi- 
tor of the newspaper) , has this to say of the part 
played by the Embassy in exciting the mind 
of China during its progress through Europe: 
"This uneasiness and hostility were stimulated 
too by the knowledge that, about the end of 
1868, the foreigners were entitled to claim a re- 
vision of the treaty, and were almost certain 
to demand concessions which would greatly ex- 
tend their influence. The grand expedient by 
which, under foreign advice, they sought to 
ward off this new danger — while to well-inten- 
tioned theorists and persons of sanguine tem- 
perament it seemed admirably fitted to break 
down the wall of separation between China and 
other nations — was so conducted as to make 
her more haughty and exclusive than ever. 
For when Mr. Burlingame went forth on his 
Mission to foreign nations, to depreciate any 
quickening on their part of the speed at which 
China was prepared to accept extended inter- 
course with foreigners, he bore with him a com- 
mission and was attended by associates of a 
character which clearly showed to those who 
knew the Chinese that his Mission was an em- 
bodiment of the central error of Chinese policy 



220 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

— the idea, namely, that China is the one sover- 
eignty of the world, and that all foreign nations 
are her feudal dependents. And when foreign 
governments, ignorant of such mischievous pre- 
tensions (though well warned of their practical 
tendency), received the Chinese Embassy with 
cordiality and responded to its pleas for time 
and forbearance by engagements and promises 
that indefinitely postponed foreign improve- 
ments, the Chinese government regarded this, 
or professed to regard it, as an acknowledgment 
on the part of the outside nations of the defer- 
ence it became them to show to the Middle 
Kingdom. Such ideas being carefully dissemi- 
nated throughout China by the literati, a class 
much reverenced by the people, and directly in- 
terested in the perpetuation of existing misgov- 
ernment, it was not unnatural, however strange 
and unreasonable it might appear, that while 
Mr. Burlingame was drawing pictures as fair as 
they were false of China's rapid progress in all 
that constitutes national improvement, the mis- 
conceptions to which his friendly reception in 
Europe and America gave rise among the Chi- 
nese became the fruitful cause of many deplo- 
rable acts, which show how utterly false and mis- 
leading the Burlingame Mission was, both in its 
design and in its execution." 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 221 

The fact that the literati throughout China 
had become imbued with the idea that there 
was no further need for concessions to the 
foreigners cannot justly be attributed to Mr. 
Burlingame's *' heated imagination." Their atti- 
tude was not in the least altered from that 
inexorable hostility which had actuated the class 
ever since the Opium War, and now that the 
fear of a new invasion appeared to be less in- 
stant than many of them had imagined, they 
naturally renewed their old hopes of expelling 
the hated intruders. The methods employed 
toward effecting their end were those of Asiatics, 
differing in kind from those to which Western 
peoples are accustomed to resort under the in- 
fluence of emotion, but an omniscient being 
alone could decide whether they were more 
deplorable than those familiar to the Western 
world, like the pogrom in Russia or lynching in 
the United States. The literary class, with the 
honest if vain ambition of saving their country 
from the subversive influence of aliens, worked 
upon the superstitious populace with means 
which they well knew would be effective — tales 
of witchcraft and abominable slanders — until a 
mob was aroused to the pitch of massacre.^ In 

^ The Shanghai Chamber of Commerce calls attention (November, 
1870) to a famous libel, entitled "A Death-Blow to Corrupt Doctrines," 
which first appeared, probably, in 1868. "Its object is to associate the 



22^ ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the democracy of China the Autocrat at Peking 
was practically helpless to prevent such machina- 
tions or forestall such uprisings so long as they 
were inspired by that respected element of the 
population from which all its officials were drawn. 
What was called a reaction in China was, then, 
the inevitable resurgence of a whole people under 
the guidance of their natural leaders who writhed 
under a tutelage of outsiders that not only dis- 
turbed their social and economic life, but seemed 
to these patriots to challenge their dearest be- 
liefs and even threaten their political existence. 
Further coercion from abroad merely tended to 
make the situation worse, while the hope of 
modifying the ancient constitution of China by 
pressure at the centre, so as to substitute a truly 
centralised administration for the practical au- 
tonomy of the provinces, was to ignore the re- 
sistance to innovations that is bound to go with 
a body-politic of such antiquity. A new gen- 
eration of Chinese must be educated to an ap- 

name of foreigners with the most revolting practices. Though a pro- 
duction of almost inconceivable obscenity and falsehood, it furnishes an 
instructive picture of two classes of people with whom we have to deal. 
The unscrupulous animosity of the anti-foreign official party is there 
clearly exhibited, and the ignorance and superstition of the people for 
whom the book is intended is made equally plain. While efforts like 
these are being made to poison the minds of the populace in regard to 
foreigners, and to stimulate them to such outrages as that at Tientsin, 
it is self-evident that the only wise or safe, or even humane, policy for 
foreign governments is one of such uncompromising firmness as shall 
discourage the hostile factions from prosecuting their schemes." 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 223 

preciation of the possibilities of a reconstructed 
China, no longer a hermit nation, but partici- 
pating in the intercourse of the world. Yet such 
a solution was, and still is, hard to attend, and 
the natives of that empire have been compelled 
to pay far more dearly than the foreigners for 
obstinate faith in their own convictions. 

News of these affairs reached the Mission in 
Europe slowly and through the ordinary chan- 
nels. The Tsung-li Yamen, whether from inex- 
perience or by design, wrote hardly at all;^ it 
continued as it had begun by allowing its am- 
bassador complete liberty of action, and for- 
warded no instructions or complaints based upon 
rumours. Its members were perturbed by some 
of these, and affronted at the opprobrium poured 
by foreign news-sheets upon their sincere effort 
to meet the wishes of Western powers in send- 
ing a representative to their courts. But, 
though disposed, after the manner of Oriental 
diplomacy, to await events and commit their 
government by no overt act, they remained 
loyal to their envoy. The following dispatch 
from Mr. Williams to Secretary Fish, so far un- 
noticed and unprinted, reveals the motives for 

^ Mr. Burlingame was, however, able to inform Secretary Fish by the 
31st August that he had received a dispatch from the Chinese Government 
expressing strongly their satisfaction with, and acceptance of, the treaty 
negotiated at Washington. ("United States Foreign Relations," 1870, 
p. 307.) 



£24 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

the Yamen's procrastination which at the time 
puzzled the acutest observers : 

Peking, October 1, 1869. 

At a recent interview with the members of the 
Foreign Office I inquired of them when it was prob- 
able that the Imperial Government would exchange 
the ratifications of the treaty negotiated by its envoys 
in Washington. . . . Wansiang, who was present, 
replied that the government had deemed it best to 
defer exchanging the ratifications of the treaty until 
the return of their envoys from Europe, and that 
this was the purport of the reply made to Mr. 
Browne last spring, when he informed them of his 
appointment as special commissioner for the purpose. 
It was yet uncertain what arrangements Mr. Bur- 
lingame might make in Europe with the courts 
which he was to visit, and until they knew this they 
deemed it the safest way to defer the completion of 
this treaty. There was no intention on their part 
of any disrespect or slight to the United States in so 
doing, and no intention to decline the stipulations 
of a treaty which was favourable to them. 

He then went on to inquire how it was that the 
report had been circulated so widely that the Em- 
peror had refused to ratify this treaty, thereby cast- 
ing a great reproach upon his government. Several 
persons in Peking had inquired of him whether this 
was true, but had adduced no one's name as their 
authority for the statement, and he had also seen 
the same assertion in the newspapers. Such un- 
founded statements tended very much to excite sus- 
picions and disturb the friendly relations between 
governments, and he asked whether there was no 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 225 

punishment for the wrong-doers, or any way of check- 
ing such marplots. 

I told him that I had never heard Mr, Browne 
make any such remark, nor had he written to that 
effect to his government, but what he might have 
said after he left Peking, and what others had in- 
ferred from it and published about the matter, I 
could not say. I myself had seen no good reason 
for doubting the good intentions of his Majesty's 
Government in the matter, and had so maintained 
before others. Still more impossible was it to re- 
strain newspapers from publishing what their editors 
liked, and in America and England it was found to 
be the best way to let them all write what they please, 
and the truth would finally be known. . . . He and 
Tung Siun, who was sitting near, both seemed to 
think that they had been somehow misrepresented 
by Mr. Browne, and sent for the copy of Prince 
Kung's letter of March 12 to prove that he had given 
no ground to the rumour, and had said nothing sub- 
sequently to support it, in which I concurred. 

They then went on to inquire what I thought of 
Mr. Burlingame's course abroad, and why it was that 
the newspapers so universally condemned him; for, 
so far as they knew, Mr. Burlingame had done noth- 
ing contrary to the purposes of his Mission. I 
endeavoured to explain the disappointment which 
many persons in Western lands had experienced after 
hearing the glowing accounts of their envoy to learn 
that the mass of Chinese ofiicials and people were not 
so well informed upon the advantages to be derived 
from foreign intercourse as their superiors in Peking, 
whom alone of all Chinese officers he had known 
here; and that the ignorance of China among peo- 
ple abroad led many to draw inferences from Mr. 



226 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

Burlingame's sanguine statements that were quite 
too favourable. A better acquaintance of each party 
with the other was now most desirable, and would 
remove suspicions better than any other course. 

I endeavoured to remove his dissatisfaction by 
again referring to the reports of newspapers as un- 
trustworthy in evidence of the views or acts of gov- 
ernments; but the impression evidently made on 
him by what he had learned from those which had 
been translated for him was a bitter one. He had 
evidently built up hopes upon the results of this 
costly business which were not likely to be realised, 
vague hopes, they may have been, but not altogether 
unfounded, of putting China in amicable relations 
with other nations. He said that full justice would 
have been done at the time of the disturbances near 
Swatow and in Formosa without the intervention 
of gunboats, if those oflScers had not been so pre- 
cipitate; but I think that he rather deceived himself 
here, for he has never visited those parts of the em- 
pire, and has probably only imperfect and distorted 
reports of the facts in both cases. . . . 

Coming as it does after the discussion respecting 
the Austrian treaty, this conversation shows that 
the foreign relations of the government are more 
and more engrossing the thoughts of its highest 
statesmen, who are endeavouring to learn the inten- 
tions of other powers, and do what they can to pre- 
serve their own position. They feel the influence 
of the age, but their early isolated education and con- 
tracted experience painfully show their effects in 
now preventing them from fully appreciating their 
rapidly altering position in the present times. They 
seem to be afraid to trust themselves to any new 
course, but still show no desire to retrace what they 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 227 

have done. They intend to give such efficiency to 
the new college that it can gradually furnish them 
with their own interpreters and even higher func- 
tionaries. Even now they obtain through this chan- 
nel translations of many articles in the newspapers 
at Shanghai and Hongkong, among which are the 
addresses to Mr. Browne and his recent letter, with 
other criticisms on their policy and position. All 
these things must have their effect in gradually 
opening up new vistas to them.^ 

Mr. Burlingame had, however, his own reasons 
for concern, and after their reluctance to expe- 
dite the completion of his treaty by an exchange 
of ratifications became manifest, he dispatched 
Mr. McLeavy Brown from Paris to explain to 
the Tsung-li Yamen the urgency of the adven- 
ture and to solicit action. The necessity was 
really very great. So eager had the enemies of 
the Mission become that, after exploiting all in 
its disparagement that could be squeezed from 
tales of its equivocal credentials, of Mr. Bur- 
lingame's prevarications,- of China's refusal to 
accept the treaty, and others of the sort, they 
proclaimed Mr. Brown's return to China to be 
a recall to his former duties by his government 
and, consequently, England's determination to 
cast loose from her participation in a discredited 
Embassy. The errand was satisfactorily exe- 

* United States Department of State, "China," vol. 28, no. 65. 



ms ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

cuted. Mr. Brown was soon able to convince 
the ministers of the hurtful effects of further 
procrastination, and the treaty received the seal 
of the Emperor on November 20.^ Mr. Williams 
as Charge d' Affaires was obliged to take upon 
himself the responsibility of officiating as com- 
missioner for the United States without official 
appointment, under circumstances explained in 
his dispatch to the Department of State. 

Peking, November 24, 1869. 

... I have now the honour to inform you that 
the Emperor has ratified the eight Additional Articles, 
having affixed his seal to them on the 20th inst. He 
also issued a commission on that day appointing 
Tung Siun, one of the chief members of the Foreign 
Ofiice, to be his imperial commissioner for the pur- 
pose of exchanging the ratifications, which was yes- 
terday accomplished with all due formality. . . . 

In proceeding to complete the exchange of these 
ratifications, I can not doubt that I have done what 
you would have had me do. There were some spe- 
cial reasons for effecting it now, which seemed to 
override all the objections that I might adduce for 
delay because I had no commission from the Presi- 
dent for this specific purpose. One of these was, that 
the bad effects of the rumours widely circulated and 
believed in the south of China and abroad, that the 
Imperial Government had definitely refused to accept 
these articles, would thus be wholly neutralised, and 
the credit of the Chinese Embassy upheld. These 

' The exchange of ratifications was effected on November 23. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 229 

rumours had already led to various unjust inferences 
as to the motives of the ruling statesmen in Peking 
for their delay, and had consequently strengthened 
the idea that they were tired of their Embassy, and 
regretted the expenses it had entailed on them. 

Another reason had reference to the importance 
of the ratified treaty reaching you before the rising 
of Congress, and the closing of navigation in the 
Peiho was too near at hand to admit of delay if this 
copy was to be sent to Washington this winter. 
The personal explanations of Mr. Brown the secre- 
tary of the Chinese Embassy, who showed the officials 
the injury they were doing their cause by this delay, 
were successful in changing their minds; and after 
he had thus brought about a result which all my 
efforts had failed to do, it certainly was hardly 
proper to refuse to meet their proposals to exchange 
the ratifications in consequence of an informality 
arising from the departure of the late United States 
minister at Peking. . . 

I have confided this copy to the care of Mr. J. 
McLeavy Brown, who returns to his post in the 
Embassy by way of Washington, and will deliver it 
to you.^ 

1 Williams to Fish. Ibid., vol. 28, no. 69. 



THE END OF THE MISSION 

THE Mission concluded its long stay in 
Paris in September and visited the cap- 
itals of northern Europe, where it was 
received with due cordiality in turn by the sov- 
ereigns of Sweden, Denmark, and the Neth- 
erlands. Their Majesties, in replying to the 
credential letter of the Chinese Emperor, each 
expressed appreciation of his desire to maintain 
and cement the good relations between their 
states and complimented him upon the character 
of his envoys. The minister of foreign affairs in 
The Hague entertained the hope that this dis- 
tinguished Mission might impress the members 
of the States-General sufficiently to enable him 
to carry out his plan for establishing a legation 
in Peking, but he was unsuccessful.^ 

In anticipation of the arrival of the Mission 
in Berlin, Mr. Hamilton Fish, the new secretary 
of state, had acquainted the United States min- 
ister there with the views of President Grant's 
administration as to American policy in China. 
There had been no change in this respect, indeed, 
since the Mission left America, but some uncer- 

^ H. Cordier, "Relations de la Chine," I, p. 301. 
230 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 231 

tainty had naturally been occasioned by reports 
of Mr. Ross Browne's speeches. It was a for- 
tunate accident that the American minister to 
Prussia was an old friend of Mr. Burlingame's, 
the historian George Bancroft, whose personal 
conviction added sincerity to the carrying out 
of his instructions from the department. No 
serious obstacles, however, presented themselves 
in this instance. The Prussian Government, 
after its successful struggle with Austria, and 
already intent upon fulfilling its national des- 
tiny in the conflict which was soon to come with 
France, desired to act in harmony with Great 
Britain and America in matters outside of 
Europe. But the dispatch of Mr. Fish is a 
document of such importance in setting forth 
the spirit which still animated American pur- 
poses in China that attention should be paid to 
it before following the exchange of notes be- 
tween Count Bismarck and Mr. Burlingame. 
Though not given the same publicity as the 
Clarendon letter of the preceding year, this 
summary of the sentiments of the United States 
toward China was made known to all the chan- 
celleries of Europe, and assured their govern- 
ments that America remained unmoved either 
by reports of Chinese recalcitrancy or by solici- 
tude as to race invasion. 



232 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

This recapitulation of principles established 
by the so-called Burlingame treaty bears evi- 
dence of being the work of the secretary him- 
self.^ In it he maintained his predecessor's 
policy, which was consistently preserved during 
his eight years' tenure of this office under Pres- 
ident Grant, and thus in some measure estab- 
lished as one of the political traditions of the 
Republican party. Chief among the tenets un- 
derlying the eight additional articles of July, 
1868, is the recognition of the Chinese Emperor's 
sovereign authority over his people and their 
political relations with the subjects of other 
countries. Though treaties had been concluded 
between China and Christian powers before this 
compact, it was scarcely an exaggeration to call 
them stipulations of force rather than of amity. 
Under such terms China's political integrity had 
been preserved less by intention than by the 
rivalries of different nationalities, while their 
sense of sore constraint had left the ruling minds 
of the empire as alien as ever toward the civil- 
isation of the West. So far from bringing the 
old accusation of aloofness against China, he 
freely accuses the European policy there of 
being one of isolation, "inasmuch as it only 
sought the development of a foreign trade at 

1 The document is reprinted in Appendix IV. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 233 

certain ports, and of disintegration, as it prac- 
tically ignored the Central Government, and 
made war upon the provinces to redress its 
grievances and to enforce its demands." Diplo- 
matic representatives had now been nearly ten 
years in Peking, but their residence at the 
capital had brought them into contact with only 
a few of the highest officials, and social inter- 
course between natives and foreigners had not 
been measurably increased by a concession 
wrung from China by a war. Dread of the con- 
quering white men and of the economic dangers 
to be expected from the introduction of their 
manufactured goods and labour-saving devices 
was still a dominant factor in controlling the 
policy of the empire. 

Mr. Burlingame's treaty was called, in con- 
trast to the policies and attitudes thus summar- 
ised, "a long step in another direction." The 
secretary's assertion that "it came voluntarily 
from China," coupled with his allusion to the 
reports from Peking that she had refused to 
ratify it, has something of the unconscious hu- 
mour of the old-time anecdote of the recruit- 
ing sergeant who, when asked where the vol- 
unteers were, replied firmly that he had them 
locked up in the barn where they couldn't escape. 
Nevertheless, his contention was valid theoret- 



234 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

ically, and the United States Government was 
rightly determined to hold to its postulate that 
the empire had voluntarily assumed the rights 
together with the responsibilities of an inde- 
pendent power, while he awaited in patience 
a fuller understanding of the real meaning of 
this new position by the ignorant literati. The 
treaty, while necessarily confirming rights which 
foreigners in China must still claim in order to 
insure the safety of their nationals and property, 
acknowledged a principle that was of too great 
importance to her to surrender when once under- 
stood. The President, therefore, had not pressed 
for a ratification because he was confident that 
her statesmen would inevitably see the propriety 
of authorising the acceptance of terms so greatly 
to their own advantage. The event, it may here 
be added, abundantly justified this expectation, 
as it did also the exercise of a wise patience in 
refusing to extort consent from them by un- 
toward pressure. 

As to the apprehensions expressed by some 
foreigners lest the concluding article of the treaty 
might put an end to the co-operative policy, the 
secretary declares that so far as that policy was 
aggressive and conspired to thrust upon China 
what could not be enforced among civilised 
nations anywhere else, the article might well 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 235 

prevent the United States from sharing in a 
partnership of robber states. The point had al- 
ready become one of some importance because 
the most-favoured-nation clause of the old treaty- 
made America a participant in any advantages 
to be derived from the Alcock negotiations. 
Sir Rutherford's demands in moving for a re- 
vision are rather significantly described as being 
"made in strong language, as necessary to the 
proper enjoyment of the rights conceded by the 
treaty of 1858, and the Chinese Government was 
warned in advance of the probable course Great 
Britain would pursue in case of refusal." Mr. 
Ross Browne's sympathy and co-operation with 
the British minister throughout the negotiation 
are noted, but Prince Kung's reply to Alcock's 
peremptory demands is characterised as '* digni- 
fied and moderate." The secretary refers with 
satisfaction to the decision of the British Govern- 
ment, lately communicated to the department 
through their minister in Washington, to accept 
such concessions as China was willing to offer 
at that time and wait quietly the operation of 
the causes which are working in the Chinese 
mind. "Such a course strikes me as wiser than 
the more vigorous policy which Sir Rutherford 
Alcock seems to have contemplated. The points 
gained may not be as important as could be de- 



236 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

sired, yet they have been gained peaceably, by 
negotiation, and are yielded by China as a right 
flowing legitimately and necessarily from former 
treaties." 

Convinced from the tone of the correspond- 
ence thus reviewed that Prince Kung and his 
associates were acting in good faith, being 
desirous to extend commercial relations with 
Western powers so far as they could without 
prejudice to their own position, he concludes 
that "every consideration, from whatever point 
of view, leads me to believe that it is neither 
wise nor just to force the Emperor's advisers 
into a position of hostility so long as we have 
cause to think that they are willing to accept 
the present situation, and to march forward, 
although with the prudence taught them by a 
Chinese education." Mr. Burlingame was to be 
told that, while the President cordially adhered 
to the principles of the new treaty and desired 
its speedy ratification, he also hoped that the 
Chinese statesmen might see their way clear to 
granting some concessions similar to those asked 
for by Sir Rutherford and Mr. Browne. He did 
not, however, assume to advise them or judge 
whether the temper of the people of China 
would justify their rulers in doing so at any 
given time. Mr. Burlingame and his associates 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 237 

could certainly be trusted to impress upon their 
chiefs at home the truth that most of the evils 
they apprehended from the adoption of me- 
chanical devices turned, when once accepted, 
into blessings to all who used them. 

This was the answer of President Grant's ad- 
ministration to the philosophic question raised 
by Mr. Browne as to "how far civilisation has a 
right to go in imposing its principles and agencies J 
on nations supposed to be less favoured than 
others." Western ideas might be presented to 
Orientals and their influence exerted for good 
and evil wherever Europeans penetrated into 
exotic lands ; but those ideas could not be forced 
upon them without incalculable dangers. What- 
ever might be advanced against the propaganda 
of Mr. Burlingame — and there were some argu- 
ments which made sincere doubters — its prac- 
tical indorsement lay in the fact that there was 
no safe alternative short of war and disruption. 

This was also the conviction of Mr. Gladstone's 
government, which was by this time in posses- 
sion of the text of Sir Rutherford's convention, 
concluded in the preceding October^ and now 
being mercilessly criticised by the commercial 

1 Received December 27, 1869, and presented to Parliament in the 
Blue Book "China, no. 1 (1870)." The memorials and objections of the 
various chambers of commerce are printed in the Blue Books on China, 
numbered 4, 6, 8, 10, and 11 of the same year, many of them diverting 
reading. 



238 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

bodies of Great Britain directly interested in the 
China trade. Their point of view is perfectly 
intelligible, but the government's vision was 
broad enough to take into account the remoter 
consequences of pushing the interests of Euro- 
peans to extremes. What Mr. Burlingame con- 
tended for had become the avowed policy of 
Great Britain as well as the United States; it 
finds expression in a Times leader, printed about 
the date of his arrival in Berlin, a part of which 
needs to be quoted here in order to show the 
really amazing progress a year of his influence 
had made in converting public opinion in Eng- 
land from the tradesmen's attitude to a higher 
kind of statesmanship. 

We could if we pleased go to Peking again to- 
morrow, and it is certain that a British gunboat 
can give the law to a Chinese governor. But upon 
the prodigious mass of the empire we can make little 
impression, and apart from all questions of justice 
and right, we incur both risk and expense in ventur- 
ing on high-handed dealings. Bradford thinks the 
expense and risk would be well incurred for the 
purpose in view, but this is the very point at issue. 
What is now asked is not by any means a trifle in 
Chinese eyes. Only the other day we were rigor- 
ously confined to certain patches of territory. From 
these shore factories we have gradually wormed our 
way into the interior, until we trade without hinder- 
ance many hundred miles from the coast. It is now 
proposed that we should penetrate to the uttermost 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 239 

frontiers of the empire by steam or rail, and nobody- 
can doubt that if we did so the Chinese as well as 
ourselves would be gainers. But the Imperial Gov- 
ernment may regard this proposal from another 
point of view; and even if the court of Peking should 
give its assent it is certain that the local authorities 
would be suspicious or hostile. ... It is alleged on 
one side that we are defrauded of our due; on the 
other that we are grasping and intrusive, careless 
of national susceptibilities, and bent only upon our 
own advancement. ... It appears to us that we 
should, in the long run, do more by patience and 
forbearance than by force and pressure. Sooner or 
later Chinamen will find out their advantage in the 
market we offer, and they will be as anxious to buy 
as we to sell. It may be very true that we should 
find them so at this moment if the course were clear, 
but in point of fact the course is not clear, and we 
might be only spoiling our own game by dealing too 
rudely with the obstacles in the way.^ 

Enough, perhaps, has already been said of 
the antagonism aroused by the success of the 
Mission in Europe. Its purpose was, after all, 
a modest one — to request forbearance on the 
part of the great nations of the West. It was a 
simple matter for the governments of these na- 
tions to accede to such a request when satisfied 
of the co-operation of the others and of the con- 
sent of their subjects who had invested in the 
trade. France, the German Confederation, and 
Russia, having little commerce at stake, were 

^ Leader in tlie London Times, December 2, 1869. 



240 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

) now convinced on the first point and therefore 
willing to subscribe; but the greatest credit is 
due to Lord Clarendon that he held his country 
consistently to the same purpose in despite of 
an opposition from British industrial communi- 
ties that might have frightened a statesman of 
more plastic convictions. A discussion of the 
character of this opposition by the most brilliant 
of the younger politicians of England, the author 
of "Greater Britain," may properly conclude 
what had already been said about the advocates 
of a policy of arrogance and pugnacity •} 

Just as America was beforehand with us in giving 
official expression to her feeling in favour of a juster 
policy, so North Germany, France, and Russia have 
united in Indorsing the action of Great Britain. It 
would be reasonable, then, to expect that the ad- 
vocates of fair dealing by the stronger toward the 
weaker peoples should now be willing to let well 
alone, and to listen with indifference to the murmurs 
of Shanghai and Hongkong. . . . 

As there is just now a disposition in some quarters 
to represent the English community in China as 
consisting wholly of inojffensive and injured people, 
it may not be out of place to set before your readers 
a few specimens of their recent utterances. At a 
dinner lately given to Sir Henry Keppel at Hong- 
kong, and at which the whole of the leading mer- 
chants and officials seem to have been present. 
Colonel Knox Gore responded for the army. One 
of the China papers thus reports his speech: "As 

^ Letter from Sir Charles Dilke to The Times, January 4, 1870. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 241 

regarded China, he contended that the Chinese were 
an inferior nation. (Loud cheers.) He objected 
strongly to the tampering poHcy followed by the 
present economical government, and styled it a most 
pernicious policy, and a policy which would not have 
been tolerated for a moment two hundred years ago." 
One of the chief doctrines enunciated by Lord Clar- 
endon was that British officials should not make 
war upon their own account, except in cases where 
English lives or property were immediately exposed; 
and one of the hardships of which the Hongkong 
and Shanghai communities complain is that gentle- 
men holding the opinions of Colonel KJnox Gore 
should not be permitted to attack the Chinese when- 
ever they think fit. . . . The Overland China Mail 
of the 19th October last speaks thus: "Let us say 
to China, this must be done because we choose. 
There is no other way of appealing to the nation. 
What can avail but threats? We may be thankful 
that just at this moment the hollowness of their 
pretended desire for progress has become apparent. 
Should another war, as is most probable, occur, the 
peacemongers will no longer be able to weep over 
the injuries inflicted upon a meek and progress- 
loving people." 

The Supreme Court and Consular Gazette of October 
16, in an annexation leader: "It cannot be doubted 
that if two or three foreign commissioners were sent 
into each province, with power first to collect revenue 
and prevent its present misappropriation, and sec- 
ondly to apply that revenue to the development of 
the mineral and agricultural resources, to the im- 
provement of means of communication and the en- 
hancement of the value of the staple productions, no 
opposition would be expected from the people at 



242 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

large. For some time there would be a conservative 
class, some members of which should be summarily 
dealt with, while others would learn that under the 
new regime the fairest field would be open to the 
most marked intelligence." 

The experience of the year would seem to prove 
that there is no amount of progress which may not 
be hoped for, provided that the temperate policy of 
Lord Clarendon and Lord Stanley be not exchanged 
for one of threats and force at the dictation of the 
China press. 

The correspondence which summarises the 
conversations of January, 1870, between Mr. 
Burlingame and Count Bismarck involves an 
issue already fairly determined in the minds of 
the writers. King William's cordial reception of 
the Mission upon its arrival in Berlin, and the 
entertainments to which its members were in- 
vited during the holiday season, indicated the 
attitude of the famous chancellor who guided 
the policy of his sovereign. Mr. Burlingame 
was able to assure him that the ministers of 
Napoleon III had personally declared their ap- 
proval of his main doctrine, though prevented 
by priestly influences from putting any terms 
upon paper. He could also refer to the volte face 
in England's policy under the Gladstone minis- 
try, and to the concessions obtained by Sir 
Rutherford Alcock after "the Chinese Govern- 
ment had fully comprehended the treaty made 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 243 

with the United States, and the full effect of the 
action of the British Government against the 
aggressive spirit of its subjects in China." It 
was not the desire of the Chinese Government, 
Mr. Burlingame declared, to make new treaties 
but to obtain from the various European powers 
"such forbearance in their execution as shall be 
compatible with the independence of China and 
the true interests of civilisation." This, in the 
simplest terms, was the message which China 
committed to him as her envoy to the West. 
If the conclusion of a new treaty with the United 
States seemed inconsistent with the expression 
of China's desire to limit this diplomatic essay 
to an endeavour to secure a fair execution of old 
ones, the necessity for this exceptional proced- 
ure arose from the treatment of Chinese in Cali- 
fornia. "It was this latter consideration which 
led to the adoption of the more solemn form of 
a treaty in the United States. A treaty, being 
the supreme law of the land, overrides the ob- 
noxious local legislation against the Chinese im- 
migrants." Upon the question of how China \( 
should be treated by the great powers, there 
were indeed two opinions, one maintaining that 
"as the treaties had their origin in force, pres- 
sure must be continued in their support, and 
that any relaxation in this system would be 



> 



244 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

fatal to progress. The other party holds that 
this system is neither wise nor safe; that while 
it may be convenient for the moment, in the 
end it must be destructive of the interests of 
its promoters; that it is inconsistent with the 
true sovereignty of China and with that inter- 
national law which does not measure the rights 
of nations by their power to resist or by the 
interests of those who do not belong to these 
nations; that it weakens and degrades the Cen- 
tral Government of China by dealing with the 
local authorities, and submits the great ques- 
tion of war to the caprice of those whose interest 
it is to make it." 

Thus far, he was able to assure the chancellor, 
all the courts he had visited had given him 
gratifying assurances as to their opinion upon 
the justice of the latter view, while China her- 
self had, during his absence, made concessions 
to Great Britain which were "a sufficient answer 
to those who but recently declared that China 
would avail itself of the action of Western 
powers in its favour to restrict rather than en- 
large the privilege of foreigners." "I will not," 
he concludes, "after the generous expressions of 
yesterday, inquire further as to the views of 
your excellency. I hasten, in the name of 
China, to thank you for them, and to request 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 245 

that you will, in response to this, place them 
upon record, to the end that their declaration 
may give still greater confidence to China, and 
an additional incentive to further progress on 
its part." ^ 

As he advanced in his conduct of his Mission 
from one country to another and was compelled 
to face new questions and new responsiMlities, 
Mr. Burlingame showed clearly that behind his 
rhetorical propensity rested a broad judgment 
and strength of character worthy of great occa- 
sions and able to inspire respect on both sides 
of the globe. It is noteworthy that in his in- 
terviews with the most astute diplomatists of 
Europe — and he met all of those who were of 
the first rank — this man, who was hounded and 
ridiculed by the opponents of his purpose as a 
mere master of rodomontade, should have im- 
pressed them with the sanity of his reasoning. 
The governments of Europe were willing, it is 
true, to join in some concerted action so that 
they might be saved from the danger to them- 
selves of China's becoming another "sick man" 
of Asia, but the policy of drift into which they 
were passing, because no one made it his bus- 
iness to define the situation and protect her 

1 "Papers of the Chinese Legation," a pamphlet containing the docu- 
ments relating to and received by the Mission up to the conclusion of its 
visit to Berlin, where it was printed in January, 1870. 



246 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

from the assaults of aggressive commercialism, 
involved grave risks to the peace of the world. 
Mr. Burlingame's claim to the title of peace- 
maker is justij&ed in that he did make this matter 
his business. It was in this capacity that he 
received welcome and encouragement from those 
statesmen who saw in the Far East something 
more than a region to be ransacked and exploited 
as a derelict among nations. He could easily win 
their consent to the equity of his proposal; the 
difficulty of his task lay not so much in persuad- 
ing them of its desirability as in convincing them 
that it could be carried out. He succeeded, as 
the unselfish idealist always succeeds, by touch- 
ing the conscience and quickening the sense of 
magnanimity in every man with whom he talked. 
We may imagine, if we please, the passing twinge 
on Bismarck's face as he recalled Denmark six 
years before, when Mr. Burlingame reminded 
him of that code of international consideration 
"which does not measure the rights of nations 
by their power to resist, or by the interests of 
those who do not belong to these nations"; but 
whatever his private reflections, the grim chan- 
cellor subscribed to this platonic doctrine, partly 
because it suited his ulterior purpose, and partly, 
also, because, like Festus, he was for a moment 
inspired by the spirit of his interlocutor. His 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 247 

reply (January 16) to Mr. Burlingame's com- 
munication, after declaring his willingness to 
reiterate in substance and place on record what 
he had said, continues: 

It is a matter of great satisfaction to me that I 
should have received the first diplomatic communi- 
cation from the Chinese Government to this coun- 
try; and I trust that the intercourse thus established 
in accordance with the law of nations will prove 
equally beneficial for both parties. The reception 
you have met with here, and of which you and the 
other members of the Embassy have been pleased to 
convey to me so warm an acknowledgment, testi- 
fies the sympathy of the German people with China, 
and its desire to cultivate with her the most friendly 
relations. I am happy to add that the North Ger- 
man Confederation and his Majesty the King, my 
most gracious sovereign, being the head of the same, 
will not cease to observe a policy concurring with 
that popular disposition. They are convinced that, 
in the intercourse of our respective countries, the 
interest of Germany will best be served by what is 
conducive and necessary to the well-being of China 
— that is to say, the activity of a Central Govern- 
ment enjoying respect, authority, and power com- 
mensurate to the magnitude of the empire, both in 
territorial extent and number of population. 

By maintaining order and security of life and 
property throughout the realm, such a government 
will afford the best guarantee for fair and equitable 
dealings on the part of the servants and subjects of 
the Emperor, the most efficacious and universal pro- 
tection to our countrymen resorting or trading to 



248 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

China, the safest way to secure the execution of 
treaties and to obtain redress of grievances. 

When unharassed by internal dissensions and for- 
eign conflicts, the government would naturally con- 
centrate its energies upon the further development 
of the boundless resources of the country; industry 
at home and commerce abroad would grow together, 
and increasing prosperity would, it may be trusted, 
strengthen the hands and fortify the determination 
of the government to follow up the policy of active 
intercourse, of amity and mutual confidence with 
ioreign nations as initiated by your Mission. 

Resting upon these suppositions, the North Ger- 
man Confederation will ever be ready to suit its 
attitude to the exigencies of that authority, the im- 
pairing of which in extent or intensity would open 
a prospect diflScult to imagine, but certainly the re- 
verse of what the interest of the Western powers in 
the growth of commerce and spread of civilisation 
demands. 

I avail myself of this opportunity to renew to 
your Excellency the assurance of my highest esti- 
mation. 

Bismarck.^ 

^ Ibid., p. 55. The German press, in contrast to that of Great Britain, 
took the visit of the Mission to their country with much gravity and 
some complacency. The Allgemeine Zeitung (December 23, 1869), con- 
cludes a long descriptive article with the assertion that "Prince Kung 
can now contemplate with satisfaction the success that has attended 
the enterprise he initiated, since Mr. Burlingame has so worthily ful- 
filled the gi'cat mission of trust confided to him; moreover, his ante- 
cedents warrant us in believing that he will not tire in the grand task 
to which he has addressed himself — to free the Chinese Empire from 
'Gunboat Politics,' and to introduce her to modern culture." 

The Kolnische Zeitung of January 19, in reprinting the chancellor's 
reply quoted above, comments: "Man kann das durch diesen officiellen 
Austausch von Erklarungen zwischen dem Norddeutschen Bund und 
China zu Stande gekommene Abkommen nur als einen sehr erfreulichen 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 249 

Mr. Burlingame had already received assur- 
ances of a cordial greeting in Saint Petersburg/ 
and counted confidently upon the success of the 
Mission in adding Russia to a European concert 
upon the future treatment of China. His hopes 
were not belied. The Czar received him on 
February 16 with a friendliness that was not 
unpremeditated, though it was obviously height- 
ened by the envoy's graceful reference to Gen- 
eral Vlangali, his Majesty's former minister in 
Peking, *' whose policy of equity and concilia- 
tion," he was told, "contributed to inspire China 
with the wish to enter into the family of nations, 
and leads her now through us to declare her 
desire that the friendly relations between Russia 
and China which have existed for three centuries 
shall be perpetual." Alexander II, who was 
usually reticent in speech, is quoted as surpris- 
ing the court by the length and heartiness of his 
reply. "I am very glad to see you here," he 

Fortschritt bezeichnen fiir die Beziehungen Deutschlands zu dem Osten 
und insbesondere zu dem chinesischen Reiche. Auf die chinesische 
Gesandtschaf t hat, wie wir vernehmen, die kraf tige Unterstutzung, welche 
die entgegenkommende Erklarung des Bundeskanzlers ihrer civilisatori- 
schen Mission gewahrt, einen sehr giinstigen Eindruck gemacht. Die 
Gesandtschaft nimmt von Berlin die besten Erinnerungen mit hinweg, 
und dies wird den Interessen unserer Landesangehorigen in China in 
jeder Beziehung forderlich sein." The correspondence is reprinted in 
the London Times of January 22. 

1 Speech of General N. P. Banks, a personal friend of Mr. Burlingame's, 
in the House of Representatives, February 23, 1870. (Congressional 
Globe, Second Session, Forty-first Congress, vol. II, p. 1515.) 



250 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

returned, "since your presence is a new proof of 
the peaceful and friendly relations which have 
always existed between us and China. I hope 
that your negotiations here will only confirm 
these excellent relations, and will serve more 
than all to increase our commercial relations. 
I am at the same time very glad to see the inter- 
ests of China represented by the citizen of a 
friendly state which is especially sympathetic 
to us." This was encouraging. The Czar was 
not only personally gracious but willing to show 
his approval of the political objects of the Mis- 
sion by according to it the full honours of an 
embassy of the first class. On the following 
day, therefore, Mr. Burlingame conducted the 
members of his suite to the Hermitage upon the 
Emperor's invitation, and subsequently made an 
official call at the British Embassy, where he 
was to dine on the next evening. The long 
strain of continued movement, excitement, and 
anxiety had, however, begun to tell upon his 
physical strength. A severe cold, too long 
neglected, compelled him on returning to his 
hotel to take to his bed, where, after a few days 
of suffering, he died of pneumonia early in the 
morning of February 23. 

No man of Mr. Burlingame's lovable nature 
passes from life without the plentiful proofs of 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 251 

esteem and affection which such a loss calls 
forth from a multitude of friends. The world 
of his acquaintance was one brotherhood of 
his admirers, and it is not surprising that his 
sudden death brought to his widow and family 
messages of sympathy from every country which 
he had visited. The Czar and the imperial 
household, the Queen of Prussia, his latest 
friends, and a host of old associates at home and 
abroad, all united to do him honour. And pub- 
lic recognition of his services followed close upon 
these personal expressions of regard. On the 
3d of March the chamber of commerce in New 
York heard a eulogy upon him pronounced 
by his friend, Elliot C. Cowdin, and on the 
9th, a meeting of Americans in Paris, called 
to commemorate his achievements in two con- 
tinents, was addressed by ex-Governor A. H. 
Bullock, of Massachusetts. A public funeral 
was voted by the city of Boston. The body 
lay in state on April 23 in Faneuil Hall — the 
scene of his early triumphs as an orator — and 
the Rev. G. W. Briggs, of Cambridge, delivered 
a fitting oration^ in the Arlington Street Church 
before the interment was made in Mount Auburn 
Cemetery, near his old home. Numerous news- 

1 'A Memorial of Anson Burllngame." Printed by order of the Com- 
mittee of Arrangements of the City Council of Boston. 1870. 24 pp. 



252 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

paper notices of his death and sketches of his 
career testified to a very general recognition of 
his noble character, his lofty purposes, and the 
loss to America of one of its great men. 

With the loss of its chief the prestige of the 
Mission was so greatly diminished that it may 
almost be said to have disappeared. Though 
some decrease in popular attention might inevi- 
tably have been expected after its departure 
from the courts of the great powers, its sudden 
extinction as a topic of general interest can only 
be ascribed to the removal of his dominating 
and magnetic influence. Under the nominal 
charge of the Manchu envoy, Chih Kang, guided 
by Mr. McLeavy Brown, who arrived from 
China via America in March, the Mission, after 
leaving St. Petersburg, was received at the cap- 
itals of Belgium and Italy, returning to China 
via Suez in October. It was the popular im- 
pression in Europe at the time that had Mr. 
Burlingame survived he would have completed 
several treaties which were in process of nego- 
tiation at the moment of his death. There was 
no basis at all for the supposition. No docu- 
mentary evidence whatever supports the rumours 
then current that he expected from the courts 
of Europe anything more than he had obtained 
already in the nature of written agreements. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 253 

Far from desiring new treaties, he was from the 
outset convinced that China's foreign relations 
were sufficiently determined by existing com- 
pacts, and that she needed for their develop- 
ment only the safeguards of fair interpretation 
which he had striven to secure. The one treaty 
which had been contracted was, as we have seen, 
not of his own initiation, however gratified he 
may have felt as to its terms, and the hesitation 
shown by the Tsung-li Yamen in indorsing that 
covenant must have demonstrated to him the 
inadvisability of asking imperial consent to other 
conventions. But, while the influence of the 
Mission was weakened by his removal, it mat- 
tered little in the end, for it had already accom- 
plished the work it went forth to do. The 
supreme misfortune to China involved in his 
taking off was, in the words of General Foster, 
that "it deprived her government of the ser- 
vices of an able and tactful foreigner to direct 
Its efforts toward a more liberal and progressive 
policy." ^ 

The possibilities which such a career as his 
talents and experience opened to Mr. Burlin- 
game on his return to Peking tempt one to 
speculations that may be justified on the score 
of its extraordinary promise. So impressive a 

^ " A Century of American Diplomacy," p. 416. 



£54 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

reminder of the uncertainty of life was not over- 
looked by publicists of that age, but they were 
chiefly struck by the picturesque features in an 
adventure which, whatever was thought of its 
importance, possessed to a greater degree than 
the experience of any other American of politi- 
cal prominence in his time the element of 
romance. The meaning of the enterprise upon 
which he had embarked was misunderstood by 
Western people and the expectations it aroused 
were greatly exaggerated; yet it had intrinsic 
value so long as it was committed to the care 
of a man of his imagination and fortitude. 
With such qualities as he possessed, he would 
have been unworthy of the high trust reposed 
in him had he not been fired by enthusiasm 
and resolved to make this Mission the first step 
of a progress in international friendship which 
the Chinese themselves were as yet unprepared 
to guarantee. But it was the man behind the 
enthusiasm that made the enterprise what it 
was, and upon him must be fixed any atten- 
tion aroused by the episode. He commanded 
in a high degree the politician's art of rapid 
apperception, and to this he added a power, 
which was not recognised by those who watched 
him from a distance, of acute observation and 
of profiting by his own experience. To his 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 255 

freedom from egotism and his ability to listen 
with an open mind to the views of others, he 
owed the confidence which he uniformly in- 
spired in those who were his colleagues and who 
knew him best. For, though impatient of study 
in the academic sense, he looked constantly to 
those who were with him to teach him, and in 
this sense he never ceased to learn. Few men 
of his varied experience will be found to have 
had less bigotry of opinion, or a more sincere 
desire to sink self in a generous determination 
to promote the truth. In this trait he recalls 
the many-sided alertness which was common in 
the New England of his earlier days, where 
his impressionable character was developed. It 
was a place where, at that period, young men 
were trained to do with energy what they 
thought they ought to do regardless of personal 
comfort or profit, and no appreciation of Mr. 
Burlingame's spirit is adequate that does not 
discover in him a reflection of that strenuous 
and resourceful age which abolished the servi- 
tude of a helpless race and re-created the United 
States. That was an age of idealism, but of 
idealism determined to see its ideas put to the 
test. 

Is it likely that the most purblind court in the 
world would have surrendered a particle of their 



256 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

fanatical opposition to Western ideas at the in- 
stigation of a man of this type who was unable 
to speak a word of their language? Americans 
at home, with their instinct for dynamic ideas 
and their faith in the force of what they desire, 
believed very greatly that if Mr. Burlingame 
had lived as long as he had a right to expect he 
would have seen his brightest visions realised; 
those Europeans who thought they knew their 
China did not. Yet with our present knowl- 
edge of that race, it seems more probable that 
the unwitting optimism of America felt, though 
it did not understand, the truth, and that the 
wisdom of Europe was at fault. Educated 
Asiatics yield far more frequently than is sup- 
posed in the Occidental world to logic and ar- 
gument, and though the process of conversion 
may take long, and involve reactions that drive 
their well-wishers to despair, a policy of reason- 
able insistence, without recourse to punishment, 
coupled with a willingness to accept something 
short of perfect acquiescence, has usually proved 
to be most profitable in dealing with them. It 
has been the eagerness of the West, its impatience 
and precision rather than its innate cruelty, 
that has antagonised them and incited them to 
desperate revolts against the inevitable. And 
what is broadly true of all Orientals, we can 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 257 

fairly predicate of the Chinese. The mind of 
China — whatever may be said of her recal- 
citrants — to-day needs no further prompting to 
learn its lesson from the West, yet it still finds 
Westerners as repugnant as ever. It has been 
borne in upon the nation that, while they must 
acquire the material strength to secure a place 
in the world, their ways are not our ways of 
life. 

What was needed in the generation that came 
after the Arrow War was some one whose intel- 
lect — freed from the bonds of race preposses- 
sion — was sufficiently penetrating to recognise 
high culture in a people so ignorant of the ele- 
ments of what was thought to be important in 
the West that a child could teach them, so for- 
lorn in the enginery of their state that any coun- 
try of Europe could conquer them, so beset 
with prejudice that they would not lift their 
eyes to learn. There were foreigners, indeed, 
who admired their culture, but they esteemed 
it as a thing apart from the present. It was 
Mr. Burlingame's genius that not only recog- 
nised the greatness of their past, but believed 
in their ability to become great again, a belief 
shared by few of his contemporaries. To this 
intelligence there was needed, moreover, the 
addition of a genial and demonstrative nature 



258 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

capable of winning friendship. For the China- 
man, beneath an exterior made serious by the 
training of centuries, is essentially a good fellow 
among equals, and quick to perceive the differ- 
ence between a gentleman and a boor, no matter 
what the outward guise. Perhaps it was an 
advantage that Mr. Burlingame, whose courtesy 
was inbred, acquired his only acquaintance with 
Chinese civilisation through intercourse with 
their very best. Europeans who had lived in 
the ports under the old system, and who were 
never admitted to the society of the cultured 
class, had long misjudged the Chinese by their 
association with the vulgar. If Mr. Burlingame 
was criticised by some of these for his fancy 
pictures of Chinese life, the critics were in error 
through ignorance rather then he. 

However this may be, the fact remains that 
where all foreigners were ignorant of the true 
philosophy of the Chinese mind, Mr. Burlingame 
was fortunately removed both by nature and sit- 
uation from the sort of ignorance which envel- 
oped others of his race, and thereby made free 
to approach the most influential statesmen in 
Peking in a way which no one else had tried. 
Unvexed by the tortuous practices of the man- 
darinate in the provinces, of which he was, of 
course, aware, but with which he had no per- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 259 

sonal experience, he elevated the diplomacy of 
the capital by taking the officials at their best, 
holding them to their promises, but showing 
sympathy with their difficulties. His tolerance 
in their bewilderment, his appreciation of their 
loyalty to their own standards of conduct, his 
sincerity, and his bonhommie won from them in 
return the warmest personal regard which has 
ever been paid by men of this rank in China to 
any foreigner. 

At a time, then, when all Occidentals were de- 
tested alike by the Chinese, but before they had 
come into their bitter experience of the land- 
hunger of European nations, planting their flags 
and pushing their trade about the world, Mr. 
Burlingame succeeded in convincing them that 
there was at least one man of influence who be- 
lieved in an independent China, and who could 
make others declare themselves to be of his 
opinion. They clothed him with extraordinary 
powers, and placed for a time the honour of 
the empire in his keeping. They watched his 
progress about the Western world shrewdly, if a 
little wonderingly, but, though abashed at the 
vilifying of a free press, they never mistrusted 
him. They awaited his return to them with 
lively anticipations of the fresh counsel he might 
give them. It is difficult to believe that, had 



260 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

he been spared, he would not have convinced 
them of the reasonableness of his plans, pressed 
home with his accustomed amenity, and in- 
spired them to forestall the troubles that threat- 
ened them by rectifying a corrupt administra- 
tion, and sending their young men abroad for 
education. With the prestige he had acquired 
it would have been impossible for the palace 
politicians to have long withheld him from the 
knowledge of the Empress-Dowager, and in this 
way a true sense of the outer world would have 
been brought to the master-mind of the imperial 
house. For it was through her ignorance, not 
her hatred, of the great world that she plunged 
the empire thirty years later into the calamity 
of the Boxer madness. 

Nor is it fair to object that the contempt 
with which the Chinese associate envoys were 
treated on their return indicated the indiffer- 
ence of their government to any real measures 
of reform. The two mandarins were sent out 
as mere pawns and never regarded seriously as 
coadjutors to their chief. Had Mr. Burlingame 
returned to Peking, he could not, in spite of the 
jealousy of powerful opponents, have been rele- 
gated to obscurity as they were. His position 
as a benefactor of China was secure, his temper 
invited confidence, his political experience, not 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 261 

in one country, but in the world, compelled their 
attention. If the high officials could listen — 
though not always obediently — to Sir Robert 
Hart's advice for fifty years, they would surely 
have admitted a man of ten times his constrain- 
ing power to some degree of relationship with 
their contemplated designs. 

If this reasoning has cogency it does not seem 
excessive to conclude that China might well have 
been saved the turmoil and loss of a whole gen- 
eration of political drifting had Mr. Burlingame 
been spared to encourage her to pursue a definite 
programme of reform at home and of friendly 
relations with the powers abroad. Such a pro- 
gramme would of itself have preserved her 
under ordinary circumstances, as it has Japan, 
from the predatory schemes of those who seek 
throughout the world whatsoever regions they 
can safely devour. But had this not been an 
effective protection against the ambitions or ani- 
mosities of all, his appeal to the good sense of a 
majority of the states of Christendom to co- 
operate in saving China from political annihila- 
tion, and the consequent danger to the world of 
a scramble for the broken empire, would as 
surely have been heard as a similar plea was in 
1899, when Mr. Hay renewed his invocation 
and secured their consent to the "open door" 



262 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

doctrine. It may be noted, indeed, that Mr. 
Hay, in his capacity of secretary to President 
Lincoln, was famihar with Mr. Burhngame's cor- 
respondence while American minister in China, 
and presumably recalled, when he broached his 
famous idea at the crisis of China's recent his- 
tory, the latter's insistence upon co-operation 
among the powers as the only safe rule of diplo- 
macy in the Far East. During this long inter- 
val China was recalled by Western peoples 
either as a part of the "yellow peril," or thought 
of as a derelict drifting more or less certainly to 
ruin. What she might be to-day had the Bur- 
lingame policy not been forgotten is a subject 
for mournful speculation rather than one of 
profit to the historian. 

Information of the death of their envoy 
reached the court at Peking on March 22 by 
way of the courier service from Siberia. An- 
nouncement was at once made of the award of 
a posthumous title of the first rank and of a 
grant of $10,000 to his family to provide for 
funeral expenses. The American Charge was 
informed of the Tsung-li Yamen's regret upon 
learning of his demise in a characteristic com- 
munication that is not entirely robbed of its 
quaintness to Western ears by translation: 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 263 

TuNGCHiH, 8^^ year, ^d moon, 22^ day. 

Prince Kung and the other members of the For- 
eign Office have the honour to inform Mr. WilHams 
that they were yesterday apprised by Mr. Butzow, 
the Russian Charge d'Affaires, that he had received 
a telegram stating that his Excellency Anson Bur- 
lingame had died of sickness the 23d of February. 
How shall we express our grief and surprise on 
hearing this intelligence? Mr. Burlingame resided 
several years in this place, and showed his ability, 
integrity, and fair dealing in every affair that he 
managed; and during the time he has acted as the 
minister for China to all the treaty powers he has 
exhibited the same entire devotion to all his duties. 
On hearing now of his decease, the same bitter grief 
has led us all to wring our hands. 

We have sent a dispatch to Chih Kang and Sun 
asking them to inform us as quickly as they can of 
the obsequies and disposal of his remains, and when 
their reply is received we shall be the better able 
to consider and determine on what course to take. 
We now send this note to apprise you of the news 
we have heard, and avail ourselves of the oppor- 
tunity to wish, etc. . , . 

(Cards of Prince Kung and seven others.) 

Mr. Low, who replaced Mr. Browne in the 
American legation at Peking in the following 
month, encloses this note in a dispatch contain- 
ing some comments and explanations of interest: 

Peking, May 19, 1870. 
... It is a matter of sincere gratification to know 
that the difficult duties intrusted to Mr. Burlingame 



264 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

had been performed to the entire satisfaction of 
the Emperor and his advisers, and that his services 
are acknowledged in a manner evincing great re- 
spect, gratitude, and liberaHty. In this connection I 
would observe that the honorary title of the first 
rank conferred by the Emperor places Mr. Bur- 
lingame on a par with those of the four members of 
the Privy Council, and is one grade higher than that 
bestowed upon presidents of the boards and members 
of the Foreign Office. It is the highest rank pos- 
sible to be given any one, either living or dead, out- 
side of the royal family. A posthumous title con- 
ferred direct by the Emperor is considered by the 
Chinese the highest mark of respect that can be 
shown to the memory of a deceased public officer, 
as the decree granting it becomes a part of the official 
records of the empire, which will perpetuate the 
name and fame of the deceased longer than statues 
or monuments.^ 

This appreciation of Anson Burlingame by the 
highest officials of China was echoed in a brief 
panegyric pronounced by N. P. Banks in the 
American House of Representatives on the morn- 
ing in which intelligence of his death was re- 
ceived: "It may be said that his work was fin- 
ished. His responsibilities and his labours were 
ended. The high and unprecedented Mission 
with which his name must always be associated 
was as much due to the rare qualities of his 
mind and heart as to the exigencies of those 

iLow to Fish, United States Department of State, "China," vol. 28. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 265 

who created it; and the reconcihation of hith- 
erto hostile nations, representing diverse civil- 
isations and opposite ends of the earth, will 
for ever stand as an enduring memorial of his 
labours and his virtues." ^ 

Two men of the Western world, and two alone, 
appear to have won the hearts of Chinese states- 
men during the nineteenth century: they were 
General Frederick Ward and Anson Burlingame 
— both Americans and both men of genial yet 
prevailing temper. Though men of very differ- 
ent quality, they both possessed the tempera- 
ment of that generation of Americans which 
strove with elemental forces and redeemed their 
country from a great moral and political dis- 
honour. The same chivalrous sense of devotion 
to ideals, bred in the bone of that generation 
at home, seems to have prompted these men to 
undertake, each in his own way, the defence of 
an alien nation against its enemies. And a like 
fate brought the conclusion to their careers in 
the prime of life while striving in its behalf. 
Others from the West, notably Gordon and 
Hart, gave their services to that nation with 
equal sincerity and more enduring results. 
They have been remembered with gratitude, 

^ Congressional Globe, Second Session, Forty-first Congress, February 
23, 1870, p. 1515. 



266 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

but none has touched the imagination of the 
Chinese as have these two. The impression 
they made was shown in the unique honours of 
a pubhc funeral and a mausoleum at Ningpo, 
bestowed upon Ward, and in the imperial de- 
crees subsequently ordering the names of both 
to be enshrined among the immortals.^ It is a 
suggestive commentary upon the race attitude of 
Western peoples that the two representatives of 
Christendom thus singularly successful in secur- 
ing this tribute of regard should have been called 
adventurers by men of their own belief and breed, 
and relegated to the category of interlopers in 
the great enterprise of "civilising" the Chinese. 
The homage of China, in the case of Mr. Bur- 
lingame especially, showed that cultivated Asi- 
atics accept and understand no civilisation which 
does not connote sympathy and good manners; 
it was substantial proof of the abiding influence 
exerted upon their minds by one whose magnet- 
ism — in the words of Mr. Blaine — "reached 
the mandarins of Peking as effectively through 

^ " As a mark of their peculiar regard for these two men (Ward and 
Burlingame), they have both been deified by the Emperor, — the latter, 
we hear, quite recently, — and their names enrolled among the worthies 
whose influence in the unseen world will benefit the Middle Kingdom. 
They are the only two foreigners, so far as is known, who have ever had 
this distinction." (S. Wells Williams, "Our Relations with the Chinese 
Empire," San Francisco, 1877, p. 10.) I cannot discover any other 
authority for this statement, but the author was habitually careful in 
everything he wrote, and appears to have received his information from 
Peking. 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 267 

the broken circuit of an interpreter as his living 
voice ever electrified a Boston audience. His 
selection for the most important mission which 
China ever sent to Christian nations was not a 
matter of accident or luck, but grew naturally 
from the exalted estimate placed upon his ability 
and fitness by the leading minds of the Peking 
Government. As an example of the influence 
of a single man attained over an alien race, 
whose civilisation is widely different, whose 
religious belief is totally opposite, whose lan- 
guage he could not read nor write nor speak, Mr. 
Burlingame's career in China will always be 
regarded as an extraordinary event, not to be 
accounted for except by conceding to him a 
peculiar power of influencing those with whom 
he came in contact; a power growing out of a 
mysterious gift whose origin cannot be assigned; 
a power which for the want of a more compre- 
hensive and significant term, recurring to our 
postulate, we designate as magnetism." ^ 

A peculiarly personal power like his is destined 
inevitably to wane when its creative agent is 
removed. As in the case of the preacher, it dis- 
appears with the generation that knew the dy- 
namic personality and is rarely appreciated by 
the age which succeeds. But men of his own 

^ "Mr. Burlingame as an Orator," Atlantic Monthly, November, 1870. 



268 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

time who had come under his spell and under- 
stood his message never forgot him. "There 
are men," declared a Massachusetts congress- 
man in the House a dozen years after his death, 
"who were young with Anson Burlingame, and 
who remember yet the inspiration of his noble 
spirit; remember yet his marvellous eloquence 
thrilling their hearts. They will not easily let 
perish from the earth the work which is imper- 
ishably connected with his name." ^ 

The credit of the Chinese Mission to the for- 
eign powers has suffered from a singular series 
of untowardnesses, chief amongst which was the 
death of the only person whose supreme interest 
it was to justify it, and whose prestige was suffi- 
cient to compel attention in the Christian parts 
of the globe. But there were other and remoter 
causes which for a generation combined to doom 
it to very general condemnation. First among 
these was the universal ignorance in the Western 
world of the history and institutional life of 
China — a pregnant source of misapprehension. 
Next must be placed the antipathy of nearly 
the whole educated class of China, at that period 
unalterably opposed to the introduction of any 
"foreign" ideas. To these should be added the 

^ Speech of William W. Rice, March 15, 1882. (Congressional Record, 
Forty-seventh Congress, vol. 13, p. 1939.) 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 269 

jealousy of the European commercial communi- 
ties in the Far East, which deliberately preferred 
to continue the old haphazard methods of con- 
ducting their business with China rather than 
to further its adjustment in the interests of the 
Chinese nation. The attention given in this 
work to this untoward factor in the career of the 
Mission must be justified by the fact that it 
was a very vital obstacle to Mr. Burlingame's 
purpose and dogged him with objurgations at 
every step. The course of this opposition has, 
it is true, been discredited by the events of the 
past thirty years; but no real understanding 
of the history of that Mission can be obtained 
without some analysis of the voluminous litera- 
ture which embodies the aberrations and appre- 
hensions against which this leader of a novel 
and unpopular policy had to contend.^ Again 
must be reckoned the wave of anti-Chinese feeling 
that overwhelmed America from the year 1870 
onward, and included the negotiator of the treaty 
of 1868 in the odium attending every phase 

1 Captain Sherard Osborn's " Past and Future of British Relations in 
China," published immediately after the discomfiture of the British at 
Taku, in 1859, may be cited as a fair exposition of the attitude of the 
English commercial bodies in China at the time of Mr. Burlingame's 
arrival there. James MacDonald's "China Question" (London, 1870) 
and W. H. Medhurst's "Foreigner in Far Cathay" (London, 1872) repre- 
sent their point of view at the conclusion of this period. These are all 
written by honest men, who strove to be impartial and were themselves 
influenced by no antipathy against the Chinese. 



270 ANSON BURLINGAME AND 

of this deplorable exhibition of race prejudice. 
And finally, the massacre at Tientsin, by a 
Chinese mob, of a score of Europeans a few 
months after Mr. Burlingame's death, shook the 
confidence of China's best friends in the sin- 
cerity of her protestations, while fear of reprisals 
drove her most progressive statesmen for a time 
into the arms of the native reactionary party. 

Yet, though the importance of the Mission 
was exaggerated at the time, the fact remains 
that its success was quite equal to the anticipa- 
tions of its promoters, and its effect upon the 
few Chinese who could appreciate its purport 
was both wholesome and permanent. " It would 
be a mistake to say," declares one of the fairest 
of the historians of modern China, "that it 
failed to produce all the beneficial effect which 
had been expected. It was something for the 
outer world to learn, in those days when the 
Chinese presented to the mind of foreigners 
ideas only of weakness and falseness, that they 
had better characteristics and that they con- 
tained the elements of great power. Mr. Bur- 
lingame was sanguine, and the expectations of 
his audiences both in America and in Europe 
overleaped all difficulties, and spanned at a step 
the growth of years; but only the most shallow- 
minded observers will deny that Mr. Burlin- 



THE FIRST CHINESE MISSION 271 

game's widest stretches of fancy were supported 
by an amount of truth which events are making 
clearer every year." Perhaps the happiest result 
of the Mission was its educational influence upon 
foreign opinion. This suffered, indeed, in the 
reaction following its leader's hopeful speeches, 
but in the minds of thoughtful men, especially 
in America, it survived this initial disappoint- 
ment, and they began from that time to under- 
stand more fully than in the preceding genera- 
tion the fatuity of treating China as a nation of 
barbarians. The assertion that the Chinese of 
that period desired "progress," as Western pro- 
motors interpret the word, was premature and 
needed to be disproved ; but it was necessary for 
Western peoples to realise why they were appre- 
hensive of the changes in their material and social 
life which were thrust upon them from abroad. 
They could see in the extension of such an idea 
only the intrusion of a domineering and eccen- 
tric race with customs and a religion that defied 
their authorities and bade fair to subvert their 
established notions of conduct and propriety. 
Their officials apprehended in it the termina- 
tion of their ancient and prescriptive privileges. 
Their farmers, labourers, and carriers feared 
with reason the destruction of their accustomed 

1 Demetrius C. Bulger, "History of China," III, p. 690 (London, 1884). 



272 ANSON BURLINGAME 

means of livelihood. But the cardinal thesis 
maintained by Mr. Burlingame — obscured 
though it was by the ignorance and prejudices 
of his hearers — that China had already begun 
her education and was capable of accepting 
great and progressive changes undertaken in 
her own way, is being abundantly justified by 
time. 



APPENDICES 

I. The So-called Burlingame Treaty of July 
28, 1868. 

II. Two Dispatches of J. Ross Browne to 
Secretary Fish, June, 1869. 

III. Hart's Note on Chinese Matters and 

Browne's Strictures, June, 1869. 

IV. Secretary Fish to George Bancroft on 

American Policy in China, August 31, 
1869. 

V. Consul Seward to Secretary Fish on the 
Situation in China, April 22, 1870. 



ADDITIONAL ARTICLES TO THE TREATY OF 
COMMERCE BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES 
AND CHINA, OF JUNE 18, 1858. SIGNED AT 
WASHINGTON, 28TH JULY, 1868 

(Ratifications exchanged at Peking, November 23, 1869) 

Whereas since the conclusion of the Treaty between the 
United States of America and the Ta-Tsing Empire (China) 
of the 18th of June, 1858, circumstances have arisen show- 
ing the necessity of additional articles thereto, the Presi- 
dent of the United States and the august Sovereign of the 
Ta-Tsing Empire have named for their Plenipotentiaries 
to wit: The President of the United States of America, 
William H. Seward, Secretary of State, and His Majesty 
the Emperor of China, Anson Burlingame, accredited as 
his Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary, 
and Chih Kang and Sun Chia-Ku, of the second Chinese 
rank, associated High Envoys and Ministers of his said 
Majesty; and the said Plenipotentiaries, after having ex- 
changed their full powers, found to be in due and proper 
form, have agreed upon the following Articles: 

Article I 

CHINESE JURISDICTION OVER LANDS ON WHICH CITIZENS OF 
THE UNITED STATES RESIDE, AND OVER WATERS IN 
WHICH THEY TRADE. ATTACKS ON PROPERTY BY SUB- 
JECTS OF POWERS AT WAR WITH UNITED STATES DIS- 
CLAIMED. RESISTANCE TO ATTACKS BY CITIZENS OF 
THE UNITED STATES 

His Majesty the Emperor of China, being of the opin- 
ion that, in making concessions to the citizens or subjects 

275 



^76 APPENDIX I 

of foreign Powers of the privilege of residing on certain 
tracts of land, or resorting to certain waters of that Em- 
pire for purposes of trade, he has by no means relinquished 
his right of eminent domain or dominion over the said land 
and waters, hereby agrees that no such concession or 
grant shall be construed to give to any Power or party 
which may be at war with or hostile to the United States 
the right to attack the citizens of the United States or 
their property within the said land or waters. And the 
United States, for themselves, hereby agree to abstain 
from offensively attacking the citizens or subjects of any 
Power or party, or their property, with which they may be 
at war on any such tract of land or waters of the said 
Empire. But nothing in this Article shall be construed 
to prevent the United States from resisting an attack by 
any hostile Power or party upon their citizens or their 
property. It is further agreed that, if any right or inter- 
est in any tract of land in China has been or shall hereafter 
be granted by the Government of China to the United 
States or their citizens for purpose of trade or commerce, 
that grant shall in no event be construed to divest the 
Chinese authorities of their right of jurisdiction over per- 
sons and property within said tract of land, except in so 
far as that right may have been expressly relinquished 
by Treaty. 

Article II 

PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES OF TRADE AND NAVIGATION 
NOT GRANTED BY TREATY 

The United States of America and His Majesty the 
Emperor of China, believing that the safety and prosperity 
of commerce will thereby best be promoted, agree that 
any privilege or immunity in respect to trade or naviga- 
tion within the Chinese dominions, which may not have 



APPENDIX I 277 

been stipulated for by Treaty, shall be subject to the dis- 
cretion of the Chinese Government, and may be regulated 
by it accordingly, but not in a manner or spirit incom- 
patible with the Treaty stipulations of the parties. 

* Article III 

APPOINTMENT OF CHINESE CONSULS IN THE UNITED STATES. 
SAME TREATMENT AS CONSULS OF GREAT BRITAIN AND 
RUSSIA 

The Emperor of China shall have the right to appoint 
Consuls at ports of the United States, who shall enjoy the 
same privileges and immunities as those which are enjoyed 
by public law and Treaty in the United States by the 
Consuls of Great Britain and Russia, or either of them. 

^ Article IV 

LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE 

Article XXIX of the Treaty of the 18th of June, 1858, 
having stipulated for the exemption of Christian citizens 
of the United States and Chinese converts from persecu- 
tions in China on account of their faith, it is further agreed 
that citizens of the United States in China of every relig- 
ious persuasion, and Chinese subjects in the United States, 
shall enjoy entire liberty of conscience, and shall be ex- 
empt from all disability or persecution on account of their 
religious faith or worship in either country. Cemeteries 
for the sepulture of the dead, of whatever nativity or 
nationality, shall be held in respect and free from disturb- 
ance or profanation. 



278 APPENDIX I 



Article V 

FREE EMIGRATION. CONTRAVENTION BY SUBJECTS OF 
U EITHER POWER DECLARED A PENAL OFFENCE 

The United States of America and the Emperor of 
China cordially recognise the inherent and inalienable 
right of man to change his home and allegiance, and also 
the mutual advantage of the free migration and emigra- 
tion of their citizens and subjects respectively from one 
country to the other for purposes of curiosity, of trade, or 
as permanent residents. The High Contracting Parties 
therefore join in reprobating any other than an entirely 
voluntary emigration for these purposes. They conse- 
quently agree to pass laws making it a penal offence for a 
citizen of the United States or Chinese subjects to take 
Chinese subjects either to the United States or to any other 
foreign country, or for a Chinese subject or citizen of the 
United States to take citizens of the United States to 
China or to any other foreign country without their free 
and voluntary consent respectively. 

Article VI 

PRIVILEGES, immunities, AND EXEMPTIONS TO RESPEC- 
TIVE SUBJECTS. MOST-FAVOURED-NATION TREATMENT. 
NATURALISATION NOT INCLUDED 

Citizens of the United States visiting or residing in 
China shall enjoy the same privileges, immunities, or ex- 
emptions in respect to travel or residence as may there 
be enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of the most favoured 
nation; and, reciprocally, Chinese subjects visiting or re- 
siding in the United States shall enjoy the same privileges, 
immunities, and exemptions in respect to travel or resi- 



APPENDIX I 279 

dence as may there be enjoyed by the citizens or subjects 
of the most favoured nation. But nothing therein con- 
tained shall be held to confer naturalisation upon citizens 
of the United States in China, nor upon the subjects of 
China in the United States. 



Article VII 

EDUCATION OF CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES IN CHINA 
AND OF CHINESE IN THE UNITED STATES. MOST- 
FAVOURED-NATION TREATMENT. FREEDOM TO ESTAB- 
LISH SCHOOLS 

Citizens of the United States shall enjoy all the priv- 
ileges of the public educational institutions under the con- 
trol of the Government of China; and, reciprocally, Chi- 
nese subjects shall enjoy all the privileges of the public 
educational institutions under the control of the Govern- 
ment of the United States, which are enjoyed in the re- 
spective countries by the citizens or subjects of the most 
favoured nation. The citizens of the United States may 
freely establish and maintain schools within the Empire 
of China at those places where foreigners are by Treaty 
permitted to reside; and, reciprocally, Chinese subjects 
may enjoy the same privileges and immunities in the 
United States. 

Article VIII 

NON-INTERVENTION BY THE UNITED STATES IN DOMESTIC 
ADMINISTRATION OF CHINA. CONSTRUCTION OF RAIL- 
WAYS, ETC., IN CHINA. ASSISTANCE OF THE UNITED 
STATES ENGINEERS, ETC., PERMITTED 

The United States, always disclaiming and discouraging 
all practices of unnecessary dictation and intervention by 
one nation in the affairs or domestic administration of 



280 APPENDIX I 

another, do hereby freely disclaim and disavow any in- 
tention or right to intervene in the domestic administra- 
tion of China in regard to the construction of railroads, 
telegraphs, or other material internal improvements. On 
the other hand, His Majesty the Emperor of China re- 
serves to himself the right to decide the time and man- 
ner and circumstances of introducing such improvements 
within his dominions. With this mutual understanding, 
it is agreed by the Contracting Parties that if at any time 
hereafter His Imperial Majesty shall determine to con- 
struct or cause to be constructed works of the character 
mentioned, within the Empire, and shall make applica- 
tion to the United States or any other Western power 
for facilities to carry out that policy, the United States 
will, in that case, designate and authorise suitable engi- 
neers to be employed by the Chinese Government, and 
will recommend to other nations an equal compliance 
with such application, the Chinese Government in that 
case protecting such engineers in their persons and prop- 
erty, and paying them a reasonable compensation for their 
service. 

In faith whereof the respective Plenipotentiaries have 
signed this Treaty and thereto affixed the seals of their 
arms. 

Done at Washington, the 28th day of July, in the year 
of our Lord, 1868. 

(L. S.) William H. Seward. 

(L. S.) Anson Burlingame. 
(L. S.) Chih Kang. 
(L. S.) Sun Chia-Ku. 



II 

J. ROSS BROWNE TO SECRETARY FISH 

Peking, June 23, 1869. 
... It is contended that the Additional Articles agreed 
to by the United States with the Chinese Embassy, and 
the policy avowed by Lord Clarendon on the part of the 
British Government, render the continuance of friendly 
relations impracticable; and that it becomes a mere ques- 
tion of time how soon the outrages committed upon mis- 
sionaries and the continued restrictions imposed upon 
commerce will compel a resort to more effective remedies 
than any hitherto applied. It is proper to state that the 
press in China represents the most aggressive part of the 
foreign community, and is not always governed by con- 
siderations of equity or expediency; but it also, to a cer- 
tain degree, represents the universal desire of all classes 
to enlarge the scope of foreign intercourse and place our 
relations with China upon a more satisfactory footing. I 
need not say that all are in favour of progress, and that 
all unite in condemning a policy which they regard as 
yielding everything and exacting nothing in return. There 
is always, it must be admitted, a tendency in the pro- 
gressive element to seek its own ends irrespective of the 
rights of others, and the foreign communities in China 
are not exempt from this peculiarity; but this is a condi- 
tion inseparable from material advancement. Whatever 
may be their failings they have a direct interest in the 
progress of China, and carry with them all that is usually 
brought to bear against isolation, ignorance, and super- 
stition. As a class they are enterprising, intelligent, and 
determined; and, representing as they do the progressive 

281 



282 APPENDIX II 

spirit of the age and the civilisation of their various nation- 
aUties, it is easy to see that they will not be discouraged 
by temporary obstacles. I feel entirely confident that 
they will gain all their points in the long run — whether 
by peaceful means or otherwise remains to be seen. Any 
restrictions brought to bear upon them by their own gov- 
ernments, founded upon principles of intercourse between 
Western nations and an erroneous estimate of Chinese 
character, will be of but little avail in arresting their 
efforts or changing their determination. 

Already the question of encouraging a native invasion 
from India and the overthrow of the Tartar dynasty has 
been discussed. It is due to the more responsible classes 
of the foreign community in China to say that they do 
not share in such wild schemes of aggression, but it should 
be borne in mind that projects of this kind are generally 
started by reckless adventurers, and that sometimes they 
gain force by surrounding circumstances and in time may 
involve serious consequences. I call your attention to 
this curious proposition not because there is any reason 
to suppose it is seriously entertained, or is at all feasible, 
but to indicate the direction in which the China question 
is now tending. . . . 

Steam navigation on the Yangtse has been restricted 
to narrower limits than were previously enjoyed, and all 
material advance is prohibited. Such a course is not cal- 
culated to inspire the foreign population with any desire 
to sustain the Government in case of rebellion or invasion. 
Small as the number of foreigners may be, their influence 
is not so trivial as to be safely disregarded, for they pos- 
sess both means and determination. The Government 
would certainly consult its own interests by a more liberal 
policy toward the merchants and a more stringent appli- 
cation of its power for the protection of the missionaries. 
If such a course would be productive of some temporary 



APPENDIX II 283 

local troubles with their own people, the complications 
growing out of an opposite policy are not unworthy of 
consideration. 



J. ROSS BROWNE TO SECRETARY FISH 

Peking, June 30, 1869. 

Sir: There can be no question as to the general just- 
ness of the principles embodied in the Additional Articles 
concluded at Washington, July 28, 1868, between the 
Government of the United States and the Ambassador 
from China. The objection to the policy avowed lies in 
the inherent difficulty, if not absolute impracticability, of 
its application to this Empire. Reference to some of the 
provisions contained in the treaty of Tientsin and the 
additions made in the new articles will show that such a 
policy cannot be carried into effect without a rehnquish- 
ment of existing rights. 

1. The Twenty-ninth Article of the treaty of Tientsin 
stipulates that Christian citizens of the United States and 
Chinese converts shall be exempt from persecution in 
China on account of their faith, and the Fourth of the 
new articles provides that they shall enjoy entire liberty 
of conscience and reiterates their exemption from disa- 
bility or persecution. Without a further stipulation that 
missionaries, who are Christian citizens, shall not preach 
any doctrine in China, the object of which is to sub- 
stitute Christianity for Paganism, the principle of non- 
intervention in the domestic affairs of the Empire would 
be violated by an enforcement of these provisions. If they 
cannot be enforced they are necessarily void of effect, 
except in so far as one of the contracting parties may 
think proper to observe them. Protection to this class 
of American citizens and to their converts becomes thus 



284 APPENDIX II 

voluntary on the part of China, and there can be no 
utihty in making it a matter of treaty stipulation. 

2. Under the Fifth of the new Articles, the inherent 
right of man to change his home and allegiance is recog- 
nised, and under the Sixth Article, citizens of the United 
States visiting or residing in China shall enjoy the same 
privileges, immunities, and exemptions in respect to travel 
or residence as may there be enjoyed by the citizens or 
subjects of the most favoured nation. Subjects of China 
may become citizens of the United States, and therefore 
naturalised Chinese without limit as to number may en- 
joy under the protection of American treaties and laws all 
the privileges, immunities, and exemptions with respect 
to travel or residence in China enjoyed by native-born 
or naturalised citizens of the United States of European 
origin. 

Considering how difficult it is under all the anomalies 
presented by two conflicting civilisations to protect the 
rights of American citizens now in China without partial 
or entire subversion of the sovereign authority of the 
Empire, how much more difficult would it be to protect 
the newly acquired rights of native Chinese! So nearly 
impracticable would it be that, even if the Chinese Gov- 
ernment should consent to ratify such a provision, I 
cannot but believe it would be good policy on the part of 
the United States to reconsider its action and withdraw 
its assent to clauses in the new articles which involve such 
anomalous conditions and dangerous complications. 



Ill 



NOTE ON CHINESE MATTERS, BY 
ROBERT HART 

Peking, 30th June, 1869. 

1. — Ever since my first arrival in Peking in 1861 I 
have been urging the Yamen to move in the direction of 
what the West understands by the word Progress, and on 
scarcely any point have I spoken more strongly or more 
frequently than on the necessity for the establishment of 
a resident mission at the Court of every Treaty Power (A). 
To show how diplomatic intercourse is conducted, I trans- 
lated for the Yamen that part of "Wheaton" relating to 
rights of Legation, Treaties, etc., long before Dr. Martin 
came to Peking (B). I regarded representation abroad 
as of paramount importance and as, in itself, progress, 
for, while I thought that I saw in it one of China's least 
objectionable ways of preserving freedom and indepen- 
dence, I also supposed it would constitute a tie which 
should bind her to the West so firmly and commit her to 
a career of improvement so certainly as to make retrogres- 
sion impossible. Availing myself of the approach of the 
time for treaty revision, I urged the point on the Yam^n 
more strongly than ever. 

As a first step, and by way of demonstrating to the 
official class that the West can be safely visited, and that 
the journey is neither very fatiguing nor very dangerous, 
I induced the Yamen to send Lao-yeh Pin and his party 
to Europe with me in 1866, and, on my return to Peking 
at the end of that year, I continued to argue for another 
forward movement (C). Thus it came to pass that, in 

285 



286 APPENDIX III 

September and October, 1867, the matter of representa- 
tion abroad was talked of every time I went to the Yamen 
and while Tan-ta-jen told me that, in a week or two, a 
decision would be communicated to me showing that the 
Government was about to act at once on my advice. 
Wen-ta-jen added that if I could be spared from Peking 
it was in contemplation to appoint myself to accompany 
the Chinese ofl&cial on whom their choice was most likely 
in the first instance to fall. Thus, so far as representation 
abroad, generally speaking, is concerned, the Embassy 
now in Europe can scarcely be said to have been a spon- 
taneous movement on the part of the Imperial rulers (Z)). 

Toward the end of October Mr. Burlingame went to 
the Yamen to pay his farewell visit, and in the course of 
it, I believe, he reminded the Prince that when formerly 
leaving Peking he had been requested, if the opportunity 
occurred, to make certain explanations in connection with 
the disbandment of the Lay-Osborn flotilla (E), and then 
went on to inquire whether he could do anything for the 
Yamen on the present occasion of leaving China. The 
Prince replied by some such jocular remark as, "Why, 
you might just as well be our Ambassador at once ! " I 
style this remark jocular because, for the moment, there 
was nothing more intended than a pleasantry. 

Dr. Martin was interpreting on that occasion, and he 
doubtless remembers what was said and the manner of 
saying it. Some days after that Mr. J. McL. Brown told 
me that the Yamen had it in contemplation to appoint 
Mr. Burlingame to be its representative to the Treaty 
Powers, and asked what I thought of it. I at once said 
that the notion ought to be supported, and on the follow- 
ing day I went to the Yamen and spoke very strongly in 
its favour. Tung-ta-jen said to me: "We were already 
seven or eight parts inclined to do it, but now that you 
approve of it so fully, we really are twelve parts for it: 



APPENDIX III 287 

that is, we thought well of it before; we think more than 
well of it now." 

At first, the idea was that Mr. Burlingame should be 
invited to go alone, or accompanied only by Mr. Brown; 
and the Yamen did not then appear to think that funds 
would have to be provided. I suggested that a Chi- 
nese Mission ought not to go without Chinese officials, 
and that Mr. Deschamps should be associated with Mr. 
Brown as Secretary of Legation, and arranged for the 
funds to support the party, fixing the rates of pay, 
etc. (jP). Thus, although the estabhshment of Missions 
abroad was a step that had been urged on the Yamen for 
years, the selection of Mr. Burlingame may be said to 
have been spontaneous; that is to say, he did not solicit 
the appointment; it naturally grew out of what at first 
was but a joke (G) . 

2. — The object with which the Yamen dispatched the 
Mission, as I understood it at the time, was to cultivate 
and conserve friendly relations by explaining to each of 
the Treaty Powers the many difficulties that China can- 
not fail to experience in attempting to change existing 
conditions or to introduce novelties; to bespeak forbear- 
ance, and prevent, in so far as possible, any resort to hos- 
tile pressure to wring from China concessions for which 
the Government did not as yet feel itself ready, and to 
prepare the way generally for the day when China should 
not merely hear the words of foreign representatives in 
Peking, but should be able to address each Government 
in its own Capital through a resident Chinese medium (H). 

3. — So far as newspaper reports go, the object of the 
Mission has been misinterpreted, and the public have re- 
garded it as promising, on the part of China, the imme- 
diate performance of those very things which China sent 
the Mission to explain to the West are so difficult of 
performance (/); the impression created by the sending 



288 APPENDIX III 

of such a Mission has besides been one that a generous, 
but ignorant and unreasoning public has itself done much 
to puff into still farther dimensions. Nothing but com- 
plete ignorance of China could have permitted the public 
to assume (J) that the vast changes now looked for are 
regarded as necessary and longed for by China herself, 
and nothing could well be more unreasonable than to 
suppose that such changes — even if felt by China to be 
called for — could be hurried forward and given effect to 
in the short time in which the West seems to expect 
them {K). The press, in its speculations as to the ob- 
ject of the Mission, has completely overshot the mark; 
it has forgotten that not one Chinamen in ten thousand 
knows anything about the foreigner; it has forgotten that 
not one Chinaman in a hundred thousand knows anything 
about foreign inventions and discoveries; it has forgotten 
that not one in a million acknowledges any superiority in 
either the condition or the appliances of the West; and 
it has forgotten that of the ten or twenty men in China 
who really think Western appliances valuable, not one is 
prepared to boldly advocate their free introduction. The 
press has lost sight of the ignorance of the West that pre- 
vails in China, and has failed to notice the real and natural 
difficulties that oppose innovation, even where demon- 
strated to be improvements; it has altogether ignored the 
Chinese message — which is : " Remember our difficulties " ; 
and has replaced it by words which mean, "We are ready 
for anything or everything; only say the word and it's 
done!" Thus hoping all things, but writing without au- 
thority, the press has not given prominence to what China 
really had to say, and has inferred from the arrival of the 
Mission much that, however likely to come to pass in the 
future, China certainly did not intend to publish as feas- 
ible now (Z). 

Although a man holding an important official position 



APPENDIX III 289 

cannot divest his words of a peculiar official character, it 
seems to be only fair to allow a certain amount of latitude 
to after-dinner speeches; it is in the general drift of the 
speech rather than in the general meaning of each sep- 
arate clause that the speaker's thought is to be looked 
for (ilf). Thus, Mr. Burlingame's speech at New York, 
harshly criticised as it has been, is in the main defensible, 
when it is remembered that, without doing the speaker 
the injustice of putting a stern matter-of-fact interpreta- 
tion on every clause of each eloquent sentence, the burthen 
of his address to a generous, sympathising audience was: 
"Leave China alone, and all that you wish for will in its 
own good time follow." That speech has been severely 
criticised, and it must be confessed that its language 
sounded strangely, read alongside of contemporaneous 
occurrences in China; it naturally suffers most when its 
parts are individually and separately commented on, and 
judged of from the standing-point of fact in the past, 
rather than from its general drift, which is, to suggest 
hopefulness in the future; but taken as a whole — and 
making allowance for the festive occasion on which it was 
delivered — the speech was a true and telling one when 
regarded as intended to sum up what would result from 
a policy of fair play and non-interference, rather than to 
describe things as they now are, and thereon to build a 
claim for fair play (N). It pleaded for non-interference 
rather from what would be likely to be the result of such 
a policy, than for it as justified by results already obtained. 
The press has launched out into the greatest extrava- 
gancies, but China — and, in time, the world, too — will 
judge of the utility of the Mission by its official results, 
rather than by the newspaper criticisms of its representa- 
tive's utterances, and while the Mission, I trust, is not 
likely to return to China without in some way advising 
the over-sanguine to moderate their expectations, when 



290 APPENDIX III 

the novelty has worn ofiF, the pubhc will of itself commence 
to see that, for progress, involving radical changes in the 
customs and institutions of a country stretching so far 
away into the almost forgotten past as China, time must 
be given and patience displayed. At the same time I 
cannot but fear that, if the public is determined to carry 
on the delusion, and will not see how unfounded its ex- 
pectations are, China, by disappointing those expectations, 
may, fatally for herself, find foes where all wished to be 
friends (0). 

4. — When asked if the Chinese authorities are them- 
selves desirous of entering on a career of improvement, 
and, if so, in what direction and within what definite 
period, a categorical reply would be as much an injustice 
to the Western public, were it in the aflSrmative, as it 
would be to China herself, were it in the negative. To 
the mass of Chinese officials the word improvement would 
convey no idea corresponding to that which is in the 
Western mind when scrutinising the condition and pros- 
pects of China from the point of view that word suggests. 
From the memorials that appear daily in the Peking Ga- 
zette, it is abundantly evident that there is no lack of offi- 
cials throughout the Empire who closely watch occurrences, 
who are desirous that wrongs should be righted and bad 
ways abandoned for better, and who courageously and 
persistently give their opinions and offer their advice in 
the cause of improvement to the Emperor; but all such 
criticism relates to the internal affairs of China as dis- 
tinguished from those affected by foreign intercourse, and 
all such suggestions appealing to the past purity, rather 
than to future advancement, founded on ethical precepts 
and ending in moral platitudes, fail to touch those points 
which the Western mind regards as at the base of all 
progress; in a word, material improvement (in its widest 
sense and suggestion of freedom of action in the devel- 



APPENDIX III 291 

opment of resources and creation of industries) is never 
hinted at (P). But this cannot be wondered at; for the 
majority are ignorant and but few of the minority are 
appreciative in the httle knowledge they do chance to 
possess. Some forty officials in the provinces, and per- 
haps ten at Peking, have a glimmering notion of what it 
is that the foreigner means when he speaks in general 
terms of progress, but of those fifty not one is prepared 
to enter boldly on a career of progress, and take the con- 
sequence of even a feeble initiative. In this connection, 
and at this point, I would call attention to a memo, which 
accompanies this note, in which I argue that progress has 
commenced, and will flourish in China, reasoning much as 
follows : 

"To secure progress for China, with her present sus- 
picions and past isolation, China must : First — either be 
allowed to move to her own pace and develop after her 
own fashion; or. Second — she must be advised into ad- 
vancing; or. Third — she must be forced into progress by 
either (a) individual management, (b) coercion on the part 
of one foreign Power, or (c) pressure applied unanimously 
and conjointly by all Treaty Powers. But the Treaty 
Powers have not identical interests, and will not combine 
to urge advancement on China. A single Power's attempt, 
even if disinterested, to coerce China into progress is cer- 
tain to see its own object defeated by the readiness with 
which China would take advantage of the distrust and 
jealousy of some other Power to oppose an inert resist- 
ance to the efforts of the would-be foster-mother. In- 
dividual management, personal influence apart, simply 
means trickery, and is sure to collapse. Advice is but 
thrown away, and even does harm by creating suspicion 
and gratuitously evoking opposition. Thus, the result of 
an examination of the conditions which now exist and sur- 
round the problem of progress for China leavers us with 



292 APPENDIX III 

but one alternative, and that is, to see if, when left to her- 
self, there is a probability of real and healthy advance- 
ment (Q). Left to herself, will there ever be a start? 
That start, I maintain, has been already made. The condi- 
tion of all progress is, that a want shall be felt; it is when 
a want is felt that the mind seeks to supply it, and some 
wants are such that in the attempt to satisfy them they 
create other wants; there is a fountain want which, once 
tapped, will make a channel for itself and rush onward 
in a vivifying stream. China has such a master, want, the 
want of material strength, and in natural life to feel that 
want is at the bottom of all wants — it is the parent of all 
progress; she is attempting to satisfy that want; in that at- 
tempt to supply a want to which she has become keenly 
alive, other wants are making themselves felt, and the 
number of wants will increase, and just as she succeeds 
of herself in supplying one, so will China's determination 
to satisfy the others become keener and be exercised after 
a more intelligent fashion. Thus, in her attempt to be- 
come strong physically, China has, to my mind, entered 
upon a career of improvement, and will, step by step, 
develop resources, create industries, and achieve progress 
materially, intellectually, morally. I therefore am daily 
more inclined to believe that the true policy is to 'leave 
her alone' — not that I am satisfied with the rate at 
which she progresses, but that I think, given the condi- 
tions which do exist and cannot be ignored, China is more 
likely to come to good in the end with benefit to herself 
and harm to none, if allowed to go along at her own rate, 
than if dealt with after a fashion of which the chief char- 
acteristics would be constantly recurring acts of violence, 
and that foreign dictation which breeds revolt and checks 
healthy growth and natural action." 

Thus, without going the length of saying that the Chi- 
nese authorities themselves consciously are desirous of en- 



APPENDIX III 293 

tering upon a career of (what we style) improvement, I 
feel I can safely assert that China has commenced to 
improve, and that progress, although slow at the start, is 
certain to roll onward with a daily increasing ratio (R). 

5. — As to the audience question, there is no doubt that 
there is a growing feeling among certain oflScials who know 
of the existence of such a difficulty in favour of its settle- 
ment by the reception of foreign representatives. But, 
even supposing some of the most influential advisers 
adopted and put forward the foreign view, I cannot with 
confidence predict a pacific solution of the question (and I 
am of the opinion, when it does come up, that Westerners 
will either have to fight for it and, by carrying their point, 
place relations with China on a sure footing forever, or 
withdrawing from the demand for an audience, acquiesce 
in inaugurating a policy of which the sole view will be to 
drive out the foreigner as speedily as possible). At the 
present moment no Chinese Minister would be hardy 
enough to advise the Emperor to depart from Chinese cere- 
monial and receive foreign representatives after the foreign 
fashion. When the question opens, an attempt will pos- 
sibly be made to prolong discussion on the Ceremonial to 
be observed and trust to their embarrassing and intermina- 
ble length to either gain time to mass troops around Peking 
or induce the Minister to withdraw his demand; possibly, 
too, the Chinese may not refer to the Ceremonial at all, 
and simply arrange for a meeting in the palace gardens. 
(A solution of the question which would be as fatal to bene- 
ficial and friendly intercourse for the future as it would be 
derogatory to the nation whose representative would con- 
sent to it. In other matters progress may be waited for, 
courted and accepted, bit by bit, in the hope that some- 
thing better will come of it; but in this matter of audience, 
to consent to anything but a proper formal reception will 
establish a precedent and, building up the Court in its 



294 APPENDIX III 

pride, will leave to the future the task of its rearrangement, 
and that, too, with a far greater expenditure of men and 
means than a proper settlement, when the Emperor comes 
of age, would possibly call for). At the present moment 
the Emperor's chief tutor is Wo-jen — an obstinate old 
man, ignorant of everything outside of China, and perfectly 
rabid against foreigners — and, however anxious Wen- 
siang and his three or four colleagues may be to keep the 
peace, they will probably lose oflSce, influence, and life if, 
on the subject of audience, they dare to initiate a proposal 
to receive foreign representatives on the same terms as the 
members of the Embassy have been received in the United 
States and Europe. It may be a debatable point with 
some whether the audience question ought or ought not 
to be raised; but once mooted, there can be but one opin- 
ion as to how it ought to be solved (S). 

Foreign intercourse cannot now be opposed, and it is 
China's own interest that foreign Governments should act 
firmly in the settlement of a question which, unsettled, is 
an existing misunderstanding, and at any moment likely 
to lead to unhappy interruptions of friendly relations. Had 
it been managed in 1860 matters would now wear a much 
more encouraging aspect. 

6. — The event of the day is, of course, the publication of 
the additional articles negotiated with the United States. 

Those articles may be of use to Chinese in California 
(though indeed I hesitate to say so, knowing that such an 
opinion suggests, as at its foundation, the idea that the 
citizens of the United States do not treat Chinese fairly, 
and is therefore the reverse of complimentary to either citi- 
zens or Government), but I question to what extent they 
will exercise a beneficial influence in inducing or encour- 
aging China to press onward in a career of improvement. 
It is altogether a mistake to think that China feels more 
kindly to the United States than to other Powers, and the 



APPENDIX III 295 

additional articles have really nothing in them (so far at 
least as .the surface shows) that did not exist before in the 
shape of generally acknowledged principles of international 
intercourse. I heard one remark in this connection, and 
that was that these articles unnecessarily admitted on 
paper, on the part of China, physical inferiority to the 
United States, and claimed, on the part of the United 
States, the ability, but foregone right, to compel Chinese 
to do what in the articles the United States promises not 
to compel her to do; and it was evident that such a way of 
putting it was not regarded as creditable to China. I do 
not enter on any discussion of the effect expected to be 
produced in favour of China on the policy of other Powers 
by the example set when the United States led the way, 
and signed articles of which the drift seems to be that China 
may do as she pleases, and that the United States will in 
no case interfere in her affairs {T). 

7. — As regards Article VIII more particularly, whatever 
its other effects may be, I do not think it at all calculated 
to hasten progress ; indeed, taking my view of progress in 
China, and regarding it as likely to be accelerated in pro- 
portion to the acuteness with which China feels the wants 
of material strength, I fancy that, were all countries to 
join in making the same sort of a treaty, the result would 
be that China's feeling of want of strength would be weak- 
ened and her progress proportionately retarded, if not 
stopped. And, in this connection, it must not be forgotten 
that the feeling of want of material strength in China is 
attended now by a sister want. China is gradually feeling 
how difficult it is, and yet how necessary, to acquit herself 
of her treaty obhgations, and this feeling gives force to the 
power wielded by the perception of want of strength. Her 
central weakness goes hand in hand with her external, and 
her want of ability to give effect to promises with her in- 
ability to oppose dictation; give her reasons for growing 



296 APPENDIX III 

strong externally, and she will become proportionately the 
more capable of performing her compacts internally. I 
am not arguing in the sense of advocating the propriety 
of holding out something in terrorem, but in the sense of 
questioning the expediency of doing anything calculated 
to weaken the very proper feeling that leads every coun- 
try to desire to secure her own safety by increasing her 
strength, as her knowledge of her requirements grows. Chi- 
nese ignorance, too, may lead her into false views of such 
action, and then into unhappy mistakes. The Chinese 
are trying to become strong in that they discern the com- 
mencement of changes therein, but simply to be strong 
enough to prevent the foreigner from forcing China to 
accept those changes, or adopt the appliances of the West, 
before she wants them. Left to herself, but with influence 
all around tending to confirm her feeling of want of strength 
and not calculated to send her asleep in her weakness, China 
will grow strong slowly; and, in endeavouring to supply 
the want felt and acquire material strength, she will step 
by step create other wants and one by one develop re- 
sources, and will in the end adopt those very appliances 
which she at the outset rejects and prepares to oppose (U). 
The motives with which China now works will sooner 
or later bring rail and wire of themselves; and while force 
would harm China, and a premature introduction of rail 
and wire ruin speculators, it is, on the other hand, to be 
remembered that to promise not to force her to improve 
would be simply to deprive China of her greatest motive 
for attempting what must end in progress, namely, that 
feeling of insecurity and that desire to provide against con- 
tingencies which induce exertion and which are initiating 
a course of action that must of itself bring progress and 
all its appliances in its train. And, as regards residence in 
the interior, and the navigation of the inland waters by 
foreign steamers (the question of the expediency or utility 



APPENDIX III 297 

of such measures apart), I fancy such concessions could 
only be looked for from the Chinese when treaties contain 
them as rights, and will not in any degree be furthered, 
but the reverse, by treaties which go out of their way to 
disclaim them. 

However advanced the Chinese may be in civilisation, 
it is not to be forgotten that their civihsation is not a Chris- 
tian civilisation; they are Asiatics, too, and there is a 
pride of race about them that leads them to tread upon the 
neck that bends, rather than to lift the head that touches 
the dust, when its owner is an alien (F). 

It is the keen-sighted policy that will not permit shuffling 
— the just policy that will not claim what it has not a 
right to — the firm policy that will not retract from a de- 
mand once made — and the personal policy which bases 
its just requirements on its own, and does not argue for 
their satisfaction from the point of view of Chinese inter- 
ests, that will be most likely to command success; any 
winking at obligations neglected — any claiming of what 
cannot fairly be laid claim to — any retreating from a 
position taken up — and any advocacy of measures as fa- 
vouring Chinese rather than foreign interests, only tend 
to cause misunderstanding, breed wrangling, invite insult, 
arouse suspicion and evoke an unexpressed, but action-in- 
spiring scorn. I am not for coercion — I am not for truck- 
ling; I think the question ought to be looked at all round 
and viewed broadly, and those points at which interference 
is expedient clearly distinguished from those at which it 
is inadmissible or likely to do harm. The West does not 
understand China, nor does China understand the West, 
and a just mean is surely to be found between the view of 
the men of the day in China who want everything done in 
their time, and of those who, far away from China, oscillate 
between extreme exertion and extreme quietude. The 
best treatment for the future would seem to be found in 



298 APPENDIX III 

that policy which insists that China shall scrupulously 
carry out her obhgations, written and unwritten, to foreign 
powers, and which leaves her to develop internally after 
her own fashion; to insist on the first will accelerate im- 
provement in the second, but to interfere in the second will 
introduce heterogeneous questions which are only too likely 
to work mischief for the first. 

I stop here, not that I have exhausted the subject, but 
that I am likely to go beyond the ground intended to be 
covered by this note. 

(Signed) Robert Hart. 

REMARKS ON THE FOREGOING 
BY J. ROSS BROWNE 

(A). — ■ Mr. Hart is an employee in the Customs' Service. 
It was not his duty to interfere in diplomatic affairs. When 
he was appointed Inspector General of Customs it was 
made a condition of his appointment by Sir Frederick 
Bruce and Mr. Burlingame that he should not occupy a 
quasi-diplomatic position, but should reside at the treaty 
ports. His retention at Peking, with their consent and 
approval, can only be accounted for on the supposition 
that he laboured to carry out their peculiar theories, and 
that they found it expedient to have an intermediary 
agent. (See Mr. Burlingame's dispatch, November 23, 
1863, and notes of interview, October, 1867; also Sir F. 
Bruce's dispatch, November 27, 1863.) 

(B). — The acceptance of Dr. Martin's translation of 
Wheaton has been adduced as evidence of Chinese progress. 
(See note to Richard H. Dana's edition.) Doubtless the 
Imperial Government was quite willing to take advantage 
of any privileges or exceptions it might contain. There is 
no evidence that they ever contemplated accepting its 
obligations. 



APPENDIX III 299 

(C) . — Lao-yeh Pin was a clerk (shoo-pan) in the Tsung- 
li Yamen — a man of no influence. On his return from 
Europe he made a report suited to the views of his 
employers, condemnatory of foreign improvements, and 
demonstrating that such things were unsuited to China. 
In consequence of this he was promoted. 

(Z)). — It was utterly foreign to their thoughts. They 
would gladly have evaded it had they not been so persist- 
ently pressed into it, even in 1861, both by Mr. Hart and 
by the British and American Ministers. 

(E) . — See Dr. Martin's notes of interviews, February 
24th, March 3d, March 6th and March 8th, with note 
from Wen-siang, Tung-sein, and Hangkee. — "Dip. Cor." 
1865, part II, pp. 445-9. 

(F). — This is certainly not much like the spontaneous 
sending forth of a Chinese Embassy. It appears that even 
the salaries and expenses were not strictly "spontaneous"; 
that Mr. Hart and Mr. McLeavy Brown made up the 
Mission and that Mr. Hart " arranged for the funds to sup- 
port the party, fixing the rates of pay, etc." 

(G). — The remark of Prince Kung — "Why you might 
just as well be our Ambassador at once!" conveys a different 
idea and, liberally construed, would probably do injustice 
to Mr. BurHngame. If it were not that the appointment 
"naturally grew out of what at first was but a joke," such 
a remark would scarcely be worthy of notice. 

(H). — The object, therefore, was to prevent all progress 
inconsistent with Chinese isolation; to avoid the execu- 
tion of treaties, and set aside the foreign Ministers at 
Peking. The war of 1860 had resulted in the establishment 
of diplomatic relations at the capital, which was the only 
provision of the treaties of Tientsin that the Chinese Gov- 
ernment had strenuously resisted. Direct relations with 
the Imperial authorities had been resisted since the visit 
of Lord Macartney in 1793. An opportunity now offered 



300 APPENDIX III 

to transfer the scene of future diplomacy beyond the 
boundaries of the Empire by depriving the foreign Minis- 
ters of all power to redress grievances or enforce the exe- 
cution of treaties. With civilised governments, bound to- 
gether by common ties of race, religion, and laws, and by 
facilities of intercommunication, a different interpretation 
might reasonably be attached to such a movement; but 
there is nothing in the history of China, since the beginning 
of foreign intercourse, to warrant the idea that the Imperial 
rulers had the slightest idea of entering into such relations 
as those contemplated under the law of nations. What 
they really wanted was time — time to repeat on a large 
scale what they had done in the way of preparation to re- 
pel foreign intrusion at Canton from 1842 to 1857; and 
at Takoo from 1858 to 1859; time to establish arsenals, 
build gunboats, poison the minds of the people throughout 
the provinces, and, in the end, when no longer able to post- 
pone the execution of treaties, make a final attempt to 
drive every foreigner out of the country. 

(7). — The word "immediate" is ingeniously used by 
Mr. Hart to show how unreasonable the public are in ex- 
pecting great reforms to be carried into effect at once, and 
how reasonable the Chinese are in desiring time to adapt 
themselves to the new order of things. The inference from 
all such expressions used in connection with Chinese affairs 
is wholly unwarranted by experience. The public under- 
stand well enough that it takes time to build railroads 
and telegraphs in all countries, and they never expected 
to see them immediately built in China; but there is a 
difference between doing a thing immediately and in- 
definitely postponing all experiment — even to the neces- 
sary preliminary steps. Time is the essential element in 
all questions of progress. With China, to postpone a 
measure is to evade it indefinitely — the day of prepara- 
tion never comes. It behoves each generation, in our age 



APPENDIX III 301 

and under a progressive civilisation, to do its part; but 
the Chinese are content with what their ancestors did, and 
have no desire to better their condition or bestow benefits 
upon their posterity. Mr. Hart would have expressed the 
truth more clearly had he said that the Mission was sent 
to the West to explain not only how difficult it is to intro- 
duce improvements in China, but how utterly impracticable 
without material changes in the present system of govern- 
ment. Innovation strikes at the very root of the existing 
system. Whatever strengthens central authority destroys 
to a certain extent provincial responsibility, and this is 
precisely what the Imperial rulers have resisted since the 
beginning of foreign intercourse. They rejected the Lay- 
Osborn flotilla because obstacles were interposed by the 
foreign representatives to its use by the provincial Govern- 
ors and subordinate mandarins, and they have invariably 
evaded that central responsibility which they are now will- 
ing to accept since they have discovered an effective way 
of evading all responsibiHty — local, provincial, and central. 

(J). — Mr. Hart is severe upon the public for believing 
the representations of the chief Ambassador from China. 
If they manifested ignorance who was better qualified to 
enlighten them than Mr. Burlingame? He had represented 
the Government for six years in China; he now represented 
the Government of China. It was the object of his Mis- 
sion to explain the condition of China. Surely, it is unfair 
to blame the public for their confidence in the faith and 
intelligence of the American Ambassador from the Court 
of Peking. That he has been deceived I have no doubt. I 
have full confidence in the purity of his motives and the 
sincerity of his representations; but I believe he has been 
the dupe of his own enthusiasm and of the cunning and 
duphcity of his employers. 

(K). — Here again, reference is made to "a short time." 
What time for the introduction of improvements has ever 



302 APPENDIX III 

been specified by the public? They doubtless hope to see 
something done within the present generation — some be- 
ginning made; but if a short time is unreasonable on the 
one hand, so is an indefinite time, which may mean cen- 
turies, on the other. It is all a matter of time; life and 
death are mere matters of time, and yet they are of some 
importance to us all. 

(L). — Did Mr. Burlingame remind the press of these 
facts .f* Do his public speeches bear that interpretation? 
Do the published speeches of the leading statesmen and 
orators of the United States, made at Washington, New 
York, and Boston on the occasion of the reception of the 
Chinese Embassy, in response to his representations, bear 
the interpretation that "there is not a single man in the 
Empire prepared to boldly advocate the introduction of 
Western improvements"? If ignorance of the West pre- 
vails in China, how is it to be removed by abstaining from 
all pressure and leaving it to the Chinese to become en- 
lightened of their own accord? It is an undoubted fact 
that they are less enhghtened now than they were at the 
beginning of the Christian era. To what process, there- 
fore, are we to look for increased intelligence on their 
part? There seems to be no difficulty in their acceptance 
of foreign improvements when the object is to restrict or 
repel foreign intercourse. No objection is made to the 
establishment of arsenals and the building of gunboats. 
Railroads and telegraphs are regarded with dread; we are 
told that the people are hostile to them — that such inno- 
vations would produce disturbances throughout the prov- 
inces; but arsenals and gunboats, to repel the advance of 
a Christian civilisation and hold the masses of the people 
in bondage, are eagerly accepted. The only objectionable 
improvements are those offered in the interests of peace and 
civilisation. Whatever tends to elevate the condition of 
the people and to enlarge the scope of foreign intercourse 



APPENDIX III 303 

is excluded as incompatible with the dignity of the Empire 
and the happiness and wellbeing of the masses. 

(M) . — Post-prandial speeches are not always satisfac- 
tory even to the Government and press of the United 
States, notwithstanding the latitude allowed in that di- 
rection under our system. Much depends upon the cor- 
rectness of the statements made and the fidelity with 
which public sentiment is represented. 

(iV). — This is, to say the least, a curious line of de- 
fence. All experience is to be rejected; the existing con- 
dition of affairs in China is to be disregarded; neither the 
past nor the present is to be taken as a guide, but we are 
to build hopes for the future upon a policy not justified 
by any results obtained. If Mr. Hart's argument does 
not mean this, what does it mean? Mr. Burlingame's 
selection proves that the Chinese have had fair play since 
the war of 1860 — otherwise why did they select him? 
As to non-interference, the only interference by foreign 
Governments in the affairs of China since that date was 
to suppress the Tai-ping rebellion and prevent the over- 
throw of the Manchu dynasty. Surely, this is not a legit- 
imate subject of protest. What other interference has 
there been since 1860, except to ask for the execution of 
treaties? The treaties have never yet been enforced. 
The diplomatic correspondence for the past eight years 
shows that they have been persistently evaded both by 
the Central Government and by the local authorities, and 
that neither the one nor the other has ever yet manifested 
a disposition to carry them out in good faith. Sir Fred- 
erick Bruce complained in June, 1863, of the "general dis- 
regard of treaty provisions manifested at the ports," and 
said that "the Central Government, if not unwilling, 
shows itself unable to enforce a better order of things." 
(See his letter of that date to Prince Kung.) Mr. Burlin- 
game, during the same year, made similar complaints, and 



304 APPENDIX III 

said that the tergiversations of the officers who adminis- 
tered the government rendered it difficult to hold relations 
with them without a sacrifice of personal dignity. Mr. 
Williams, in 1866, said the effects of the lesson taught by 
the war of 1860 were passing away, and the rulers were 
becoming more obstructive and impracticable than ever. 
Sir Rutherford Alcock, in 1868, protested in the strongest 
terms against the continued disregard of treaty stipula- 
tions, and complained that their modest essential provi- 
sions were rendered nugatory by the vis inertia and shuffling 
evasions of the Imperial Government. The whole diplo- 
matic corps at Peking up to the present time have, during 
the whole term of their existence at the capital, been chiefly 
engaged in making similar protests and remonstrances. 
The merchants at the treaty ports, through their Chambers 
of Commerce, have filled the archives of the Legation with 
proofs of the persistent manner in which trade has been 
obstructed and treaty rights violated; the missionaries 
have written in vain from all parts of the country protest- 
ing against the indignities and abuses heaped upon them 
by the local mandarins, in direct violation of treaty stipu- 
lations; in effect, there is no difference of opinion on the 
subject among foreigners in China. Is this universal tes- 
timony to be disregarded.'' To whom are we to look for 
the truth if not to our own representatives, and to all 
classes who hold intercourse with the Chinese? And yet 
the Government of the United States, in July, 1868, 
adopted actual articles practically granting the Chinese 
exemption from all existing obligations; and Lord Clar- 
endon, in December, 1868, understood from Mr. Burlin- 
game that the Chinese Government were fully alive to 
the expediency, or even necessity, for their own interests, 
of facilitating and encouraging intercourse with foreign 
nations, etc., and fully admitted "that the Chinese Gov- 
ernment were entitled to count upon the forbearance of 



APPENDIX III 305 

foreign nations." It might reasonably be asked what had 
been done to the Cliinese to give them such an extraordi- 
nary claim to consideration and forbearance. All the tes- 
timony shows a persistent violation of treaties during a 
period of eight years, when there was no interference in 
their affairs, beyond the existence of the treaties them- 
selves, save to suppress a rebelUon which threatened the 
overthrow of the Government. With this experience be- 
fore him, Mr. Hart tliinks it quite justifiable to say, 
"Leave China alone, and all that you wish for will, in its 
own good time, follow." Such a defence, it seems to me, 
manifests a liberal desire to sustain all sides of the ques- 
tions, however conflicting, rather than a strict adherence 
to any established principle of policy. While he approves 
of non-interference, he thinks that if the public "will not 
see how unfounded its expectations (based upon non- 
interference) are, China, by disappointing those expecta- 
tions may, fatally for herself, find foes where all wished 
to be friends"; and this is a condition of things which he 
considers "hopeful." 

(^0). — Mr. Hart is quite right in saying that the word 
"improvement" conveys to the mass of Chinese oflScials 
no idea corresponding to that which is in the Western 
mind. The difference is simply this: By improvement. 
Western nations mean ameliorating the condition of the 
people, developing the resources of the country, increas- 
ing the profits of labour, and enhancing the comfort, free- 
dom, and happiness of all — in other words, profiting by 
the experience of the past, and advancing with ever- 
accumulating intelligence into the future. The Chinese 
mean the cultivation of memory and an adherence to 
time-honoured usages, blindly imitating the past and ob- 
durately resisting all reforms. Progress, with the one, 
means going forward, with the other, going backward. 
Arts are lost, sciences forgotten; the whole Chinese na- 



306 APPENDIX III 

tion is far gone in demoralisation and decay; and yet Mr. 
Burlingame assumes that the prospect is cheering, if we 
will only let them alone; and Mr. Hart thinks so too, but 
with the reservation that China may possibly disappoint 
public expectation by progressing in the wrong direction. 
(P). — This is no new feature in the Chinese system. 
It has been in existence ever since the Empire was founded. 
However beneficial it may seem in theory, it is practically 
one of the greatest existing abuses. The Peking Gazette 
is notoriously an organ of official chicanery, intrigue, and 
deception. It rarely contains a single reliable statement. 
The Censors are the most corrupt of all the official classes. 
Their opinions are bought and sold, their censures are in- 
sincere, and their apparent boldness in denouncing fraud 
and malfeasance in high places is designed more frequently 
to cover up the misconduct of the parties accused, or their 
own shortcomings, than to secure honesty in the adminis- 
tration of public affairs. To advise, and even censure, 
the Emperor has a democratic appearance, but it is like 
all Chinese falsehood — a constitutional habit of untruth, 
unaccountable to foreigners in its aimlessness, for few be- 
lieve in it except the most ignorant. When the Emperor 
wants to do anything which he fears may be disapproved 
by any portion of the official classes, the Censors speedily 
take the hint, and he is boldly lectured for not doing it. 
I am surprised that Mr. Hart should refer to so shallow a 
system of jugglery as evidence of anything whatever, save 
that spirit of deception which pervades the whole fabric 
of Chinese society. He admits that these Censors, who 
so freely express themselves on public affairs, never hint 
at material improvement in the Western sense. The 
Peking Gazette never yet contained a memorial from the 
boldest mandarin in the land recommending an experi- 
ment in railways or telegraphs, and yet there are man- 
darins who have professed to be friendly to these improve- 



APPENDIX III 307 

ments. Why does not Prince Kung himseK, or Wen-siang, 
or some other of the supposed friends of progress, come 
out and prepare the way? If the Emperor can be told un- 
pleasant truths, why not tell him some of the advantages 
of railways and telegraphs? If the people are opposed to 
them, why should not the few intelligent men who are 
said to be friendly to the cause place reliable information 
on the subject before the people? Mr. Hart says the 
majority of the official classes are ignorant, and few of the 
minority are appreciative in the little knowledge they pos- 
sess. This is not what was recently represented in the 
United States; not what was said of Prince Kung and of 
Wen-siang, and of others, who have been compared to 
leading American statesmen, nor was it the inducement 
offered for the admission of China into the family of civil- 
ised nations. But this general ignorance, instead of fur- 
nishing a reason for withdrawing all pressure tending to 
infuse new ideas into the minds of the rulers and people, 
presents the best possible reason why they should be 
speedily enlightened, if we desire to hold sociable relations 
with them at all. It is abundantly manifest that there 
can be no satisfactory intercourse so long as one party 
evades the execution of treaties upon which trade and 
friendly intercourse depend, while the other bases its 
hopes of advance upon vague and delusive theories and 
practical withdrawal of all coercive power from its repre- 
sentatives and all protection from its citizens. 

(Q) . — In reference to these three propositions, it is 
sufficient to say: 1st. — That China advanced at her own 
pace and after her own fashion for upwards of two thousand 
years, at the expiration of which period she had so far 
degenerated as to have lost nearly all her arts and sciences 
and fallen into a state of hopeless decay; and it was not 
until foreign Powers forced open her ports and imposed 
new conditions upon her that she advanced a single step 



308 APPENDIX III 

in the direction of material improvement. 2nd. — Mr. 
Hart's advice is more than useless. 3rd. — He contends 
that coercion cannot be applied successfully by one Power, 
and that pressure will not be applied unanimously by all 
the Treaty Powers because of diversity of interests; hence, 
that there is no alternative but to leave her alone, and 
thereby induce "a real and healthy advancement." But 
he has already admitted (see note N) that all experience 
is against this self -advancement — that the hope of spon- 
taneous progress is not based upon either the past or 
present condition of China, or upon any results hitherto 
obtained, but rather upon a liberal interpretation of a 
speech made upon a festive occasion by the American 
Ambassador from China, the general tone of which was 
" to sum up what would result from a policy of fair play 
and non-interference, rather than to describe things as 
they now are." 

(jR) . — Mr. Hart makes the encouraging announcement 
that voluntary progress has already commenced — that a 
start has already been made. When we analyse the ground 
upon which this assertion is made, it appears that the 
Imperial Government feels the want of material strength, 
not to govern the provinces and compel an observance of 
treaties on the part of the provincial mandarins (because 
that would be an innovation upon the time-honoured prin- 
ciples of local responsibility), but to resist foreign intru- 
sion or impose such onerous restrictions upon foreign in- 
tercourse as to narrow its limits to the treaty ports and, 
if possible, regain that position of isolation which the 
Empire had enjoyed for so many centuries. What other 
kind of "material strength" is meant than that which is 
acquired through arsenals and gunboats, what other do 
we hear of in China, and what other do they feel the want 
of? Mr. Hart refers explicitly to armaments and muni- 
tions for war. He has already stated that improvements, 



APPENDIX III 309 

such as railroads, telegraphs, etc., are neither understood 
nor desired, and that of the "ten or twenty men in China 
who really think Western appliances valuable not one 
is prepared to boldly advocate their free introduction." 
Reduced to the legitimate meaning, therefore, the state- 
ment that progress has actually commenced amounts to 
this : That the Chinese Government is establishing arsenals 
and building gunboats for the purpose of restricting for- 
eign intercourse to such limits as it may deem consistent 
with the preservation of its ancient system; in other 
words, to resist all innovation from the West not essential 
to warlike purposes. The objection to free intercourse is, 
that it tends to enlighten the people and destroy the des- 
potic rule of the mandarins; it introduces change, which 
is fatal to the permanency of the system. When we are 
told, therefore, that the Embassy from China means prog- 
ress — means the unification of the whole human race — 
means that China desires to come into warmer and more 
intimate relations with the nations of the West — that 
she comes forward of her own free-will and asks to be re- 
ceived into the family of nations, it is difficult to conceive 
upon what ground these extraordinary assumptions of 
friendship are founded. Viewed in the Ught of such repre- 
sentations, and in connection with Mr. Hart's statement 
of facts, China desires to become a member of the Chris- 
tian family because she desires to retain her pagan systems; 
she is entitled to forbearance and friendly treatment be- 
cause she is establishing arsenals and building gunboats 
to resist the execution of treaties; she is advancing in the 
arts of war and, therefore, "the true policy is to leave her 
alone." But Mr. Hart subsequently admits (clause 7) that 
if we leave her alone she will not feel that want of mate- 
rial strength which is producing these beneficial results, 
but will relapse into indifference and cease to advance. 
What, then, is to be done.'^ We must not advise her, be- 



310 APPENDIX III 

cause advice creates suspicion; we must not force her, 
because the use of force would be unjust and would not 
produce the desired results; we must not press her, be- 
cause united pressure, which is impracticable owing to 
diversity of interests, would be essential to success; we 
must leave her alone that she may advance of her own 
accord. But if we leave her alone she will not advance. 
This Mr. Hart considers natural and healthy progress. 
I see no other conclusion to these arguments, and must 
confess that they strike me as more ingenious than logical. 

(S). — By far the most important part of Mr. Hart's 
communication is that relating to the audience question. 
The revelations marked by himself in brackets are as- 
tounding. No man understands better than Mr. Hart 
the feeling of the Chinese rulers on this subject. He is in 
daily contact with them; his advice is sought on all im- 
portant occasions. (See notes of Mr. Burlingame's inter- 
views, October, 1867.) He is constantly consulted upon 
questions of foreign policy. He speaks the Chinese lan- 
guage fluently, and has had many years' experience of 
Chinese diplomacy. His statements cannot be regarded 
as mere conjectures. What he so confidently asserts is 
based upon personal knowledge. I refrain from an an- 
alysis of these extraordinary developments. They require 
no comment. If Western governments can see in them 
any evidence of a desire on the part of China to accept 
the obligations as well as the privileges of international 
law, or the shghtest disposition to enter upon terms of 
equality into the family of nations, I can no longer under- 
stand the use of words or the value of facts. 

(T). — Mr. Hart is a British subject, and therefore 
may be supposed to have prejudices in favour of his own 
nationality. His statement, however, in regard to the 
absence of any preference on the part of the Chinese for 
Americans is attested by most of our diplomatic repre- 



APPENDIX III 311 

sentatives and by all American residents in China. We 
are recipients of all the advantages gained by British and 
French arms, and are, in the eyes of the Chinese, accom- 
plices in the acts of hostility committed by those Powers. 
The ratification of the New Articles, though they were 
made in the interest of China, is postponed, partly be- 
cause of the complications growing out of the favoured- 
nation clause in all the treaties, but chiefly, as I now be- 
lieve, because they regard all special tenders of advantages 
by foreign governments as covering some sinister project 
to open up the country. The mere mention of railroad 
and telegraph fills them with visions of unrestricted inter- 
course. When they are told by a progressive and enter- 
prising nation that these improvements will not be forced 
upon them, they naturally tax their ingenuity to find out 
where, or in what form, the new assault upon their estab- 
lished usages is going to be made. 

(U). — Mr. Hart's comments upon Article VIII (em- 
braced in this paragraph) quite concur with my own 
views, and show very clearly the fallacy of the laissez- 
faire policy advocated by himself. In reference to the 
other positions of his argument, I think that the attempt 
to become strong by rejecting all improvements made in 
the interests of peace and accepting only those designed 
for warlike purposes will fail to result satisfactorily. Cer- 
tainly, it is not a healthy mode of progress, nor is it likely 
to conduce to peaceful relations. The difficulty is clearly 
summed up in the following words: "China's ignorance 
may lead her into false views of such action, and then 
into unhappy mistakes." She has already, on more than 
one occasion, deemed herself strong when she was weak. 
She may do so again, and war will be the result. 

(F). — All these arguments tending to show that healthy 
progress has commenced strike me as fallacious. Doubt- 
less China has desires to be strong enough to resist mate- 



312 APPENDIX III 

rial reform, but she is too ignorant and too short-sighted 
to see that nothing less than a radical change in her system 
will give her real strength; and who believes that she de- 
sires such a change? While she causes a few companies 
of soldiers to be drilled by foreign officers, she rejects the 
essential means of discipline — rations honestly distrib- 
uted and compensation honestly paid. The same is the 
case with her so-called naval service. Fiscal corruption 
lies at the very foundation of her system. All her provin- 
cial officers, constituting the most powerful class in the 
Empire, will resist reform to the bitter end, because in it 
they see a centralisation of power and the decadence of 
their own influence. They will not voluntarily relinquish 
the profits and emoluments of official positions, to attain 
which they have devoted the best years of their lives. 
There is no patriotic feeling, no spirit of nationality to 
bind the different classes together in the acceptance of 
any policy for the common good. Grasp at the whole 
Chinese nation, and you hold in your hand but a single 
Chinaman. It resembles an enormous vessel filled with 
fine shot; there is insulation without individuality — ag- 
gregation without cohesion. No other such example of 
all-pervading selfishness exists upon earth. Dr. Williams, 
in his "Middle Kingdom," has well defined the Gov- 
ernment to be "one of the most unmixed despotisms 
now existing" — a graduated despotism permeating every 
branch of society, and preserving subordination by the 
"threefold cord of responsibility, fear, and isolation." 
I append the passage in full containing as it does 
the best analysis I have yet read of the organism of 
the Chinese Government. Will the experience of Dr. 
Williams, a resident of China for thirty-seven years, 
learned in the language, literature, and official usages of 
the country, a diplomatic employee of the Government of 
the United States for the past nine years, be cast aside as 



APPENDIX III 313 

worthless because it does not accord with delusive theories 
of Chinese perfection? Yet this is the cruel and debasing 
system which is compared to the democracy of America; 
this is the pagan despotism which Christian nations are 
now pledging themselves to sustain; this is the hoary 
civilisation which the dormant powers of the world are 
united to perpetuate untainted and unadulterated ! 

It is unjust to Great Britain and derogatory to our own 
dignity to assume special merit for the forbearance with 
which we have always acted toward China. What ad- 
vantages do we possess in China which have not been 
gained by the force employed by other Governments? 
The indemnity obtained by Mr. Reed for injuries inflicted 
upon our commerce was extorted by British arms, and 
we now enjoy the benefit of a surplus amounting to over 
two hundred thousand dollars to which we have no moral 
right. The American Minister is permitted to reside in 
Peking under the second Article of the British Treaty and 
the third Article of the French; and American citizens 
are permitted to travel in the interior (wherever they can 
travel) under the ninth Article of the British and the 
eighth Article of the French Treaty. It is absurd, there- 
fore, to talk of an exclusive American interest, or to assume 
an influence over the Chinese because we stand in the 
background and become recipients of the bounty of other 
nations. If the principle of our interest is right — and I 
do not question its general propriety — it should be main- 
tained without injustice to others, and not because we 
may be able to conserve the position we occupy, with its 
continued advantages of peace and the profits, without 
the expenses of war, to our own benefit. Indeed, there 
is no such thing as exclusive privileges or advantages in 
China except such as may result from the ordinary laws 
of trade. As Mr. Burlingame well observes, "By the 
favoured-nation clause in the treaties, no nation can gain 



314 APPENDIX III 

by any sharp act of diplomacy any privilege not secured 
to all." 

. It is difficult to see any good reason why we should 
regret all the testimony furnished by experienced observers, 
and base our hopes of progress upon theories unsupported 
by facts. 

No personal abuse for opinions honestly entertained by 
the undersigned, or by any other public officer, will re- 
move the prejudices of the Chinese against our civilisa- 
tion; no amount of vituperation applied to our merchants 
and missionaries will impair their rights under existing 
treaties. If the Government of the United States per- 
forms its duty, it will give them the protection to which 
they are entitled. 

J. Ross Browne. 



IV 
MR. FISH TO MR. BANCROFT 

Department of State, 
Washington, August 31, 1869. 

Sir: Referring again to your dispatch No. 8, of the 
4th of May last, I propose to give briefly the views of 
the Department as to the poh'cy to be pursued toward 
China. 

I am induced to do this mainly because the charge 
d'affaires of North Germany has, under instructions from 
his government, inquired of me whether the President 
still adheres to the principles established by the addi- 
tional articles to the treaty of June 18, 1858, which were 
concluded July 28, 1868. That government has, on sev- 
eral occasions, manifested a desire to harmonise its policy 
with ours in the Pacific. While I have freely communi- 
cated to Mr. Krause the views which we entertain, and 
have gone so far as to read to him copious extracts from 
the communications of Mr. Browne and Mr. George 
Seward from China, I thought, as you are soon to meet 
Mr. Burlingame and his colleagues, it may be well to give 
you a little more in detail the views of the President on 
this question. The great principle which underlies the 
articles of July, 1868, is the recognition of the sovereign 
authority of the imperial government at Peking over the 
people of the Chinese empire and over their social, com- 
mercial, and political relations with the western powers. 
Although it is true that many of the Christian govern- 
ments, including the United States, had before then con- 
cluded treaties with the imperial government, yet it is 

315 



316 APPENDIX IV 

scarcely exaggeration to say that their relations at that 
time were rather those of force than of amity. 

The commercial foothold along the coast had been 
gained by conflict or by demonstrations of force, and were 
held in the same way. The occupation which, originally 
hostile, had become commercial — and so far friendly as 
the relations of commerce demanded a show of amity — 
aimed in the commencement, with some European set- 
tlers, at territorial acquisition; but this tendency had been 
checked by the rivalry of different nationalities until the 
foreign jurisdiction, more by the tacit consent of the for- 
eigners than from any active power exercised by the 
Chinese, had become limited to the essental matters of 
the municipal government of the communities of Euro- 
peans and the exercise of jurisdiction over their persons 
and properties. The communication between China and 
the outside world was merely confined to the trading 
points. With the intellects that rule that nation of four 
hundred and fifty millions of people, with the men who 
gave it its ideas and directed its policy, with its vast in- 
ternal industries, with its great agricultural population, 
the traders, consuls, and functionaries of the ports rarely 
came in contact except in the contact of war. The 
European-Chinese policy was one of isolation, inasmuch 
as it only sought the development of a foreign trade at 
certain particular ports, and of disintegration, as it prac- 
tically ignored the central government and made war 
upon the provinces to redress its grievances and to enforce 
its demands. 

It is true, indeed, that by the treaty of Tientsin, in 
1858, the privilege was secured to the United States and 
the European powers to maintain legations at Peking, and 
that for the ten years that followed diplomatic repre- 
sentatives resided here. It is also true that from that resi- 
dence and the contact with the higher Chinese officials 



APPENDIX IV 317 

there has come a better knowledge of the Chinese nation 
and of the relation between its people and its government; 
but it is none the less true that those treaties closed a war 
which resulted disastrously to China; that before their 
ratifications could be exchanged another war became 
necessary to enforce them; that the concessions they 
contained were forced from the imperial government; 
that the new policy was not favoured by the Chinese 
statesmen; that it did not measurably increase the per- 
sonal intercourse between the natives and the Europeans; 
and that many of the wisest of the Chinese rulers hon- 
estly dreaded any increase in such intercourse, as tending 
to the introduction in China of the labour-saving machines 
of the west which, in their judgment, would throw mul- 
titudes of people in their thickly settled country out of 
employment, reduce them to beggary and starvation, and 
inflict irreparable woes on China. For an able and tem- 
perate statement of these views by a person who is de- 
scribed by Mr. Browne as a man " of acknowledged ability 
and commanding influence," "who is regarded as the most 
enlightened statesman of the empire," I refer you to the 
remarkable inclosure which I shall subsequently allude 
to further. To say that such views are fallacious and 
obsolete; that they are confuted by the experience of 
western nations like England and Belgium, which have 
as great a population to the square mile as China; that 
they are opposed to all sound theories of pohtical economy, 
does not meet the case. The facts remain that they did 
at one time control the policy of China, and that they are 
still adhered to by many of her leading statesmen; and in 
dealing with this question these facts must not be lost 
sight of. 

The treaty negotiated by Mr. Burlingame and his col- 
leagues was a long step in another direction. It came 
voluntarily from China, and placed that power in theory 



318 APPENDIX IV 

on the same diplomatic footing with the nations of the 
western world. It recognises the imperial government as 
the power to withhold or to grant further commercial 
privileges, and also as the power whose duty it is to enforce 
the peaceful enjoyment of the rights already conferred. 

While it confirms the interterritorial jurisdiction con- 
ferred by former treaties upon European and American 
functionaries over the persons and properties of their coun- 
trymen, it recognises at the same time the territorial integ- 
rity of China, and prevents such a jurisdiction from being 
stretched beyond its original purpose. While it leaves in 
China the sovereign power of granting to foreigners here- 
after the right to construct lines of railroads and tele- 
graphs, of opening mines, of navigating the rivers of the 
empire with steamers, and of otherwise increasing the 
outlets for its wealth by the use of the appliances of 
western civilisation, it contemplates that China shall 
avail herself of these appliances by reasonable conces- 
sions, to be made as public necessities and the power of 
the government to influence public opinion will permit. 
This treaty has not yet been ratified by the imperial 
government, and I am informed by Mr. Browne that 
Prince Kung "deems it advisable to defer the exchange 
of ratifications till the return of the Chinese plenipoten- 
tiaries." Mr. Browne does not "infer any slight to our 
government from this delay, or any want of appreciation 
of its friendship," and he thinks that "the true cause of 
the delay may be found in the peculiar attitude of China 
toward all the treaty powers." " When the government of 
China," he adds, "is satisfied that it will not be injurious 
to its interests to accept these articles, it will do so." 

The President has been disposed to view this matter in 
the same light, and, therefore, has not pressed for a rati- 
fication, feeling confident that, as the treaty is so much 
for the interest of China, the statesmen of that empire 



APPENDIX IV 319 

must inevitably see the propriety of authorising the rati- 
fication to be exchanged. Rumours reach us by telegraph 
from Hongkong, by way of London, that the imperial 
government have decided not to ratify this treaty, but 
we are not inclined to credit them, as they are opposed to 
the general tenor of our information. Some things have 
taken place, however, which, regarded by themselves, 
tend to lead us to the conclusion that it is possible that 
China may reverse her policy; and in order that you may 
have full information on this subject, it is proper that I 
should briefly state them. 

Not long after the treaties of Tientsin, what is known 
as the co-operative policy of the great powers in China 
began; I think this dates from about the year 1863, but 
it is immaterial for my present purpose whether it began 
earlier or later. Under this policy, favoured by the fact 
that most or all of the treaties with the western powers 
contained the most-favoured-nation clause, the Christian 
communities of all nationalities in China have been re- 
garded as having a common political as well as commercial 
interest, to be pursued under joint counsels, and it has 
followed from this that in important matters the Chinese 
officials have been made to see, sometimes even with a 
show of ostentation, that there was a substantial unity of 
design among all the powers. The apprehension has been 
expressed lest the operation of the eighth article of the 
treaty of July should put a stop to this co-operative policy; 
and I am bound to say that, so far as that policy was 
aggressive and attempted to force upon China measures 
which could not be enforced upon a European or American 
state by the rules of the equitable code, which regulates 
the intercourse of civilised nations, in my judgment, that 
article may, when ratifications are exchanged, prevent 
the United States from participating in such a policy. 

The question becomes a practical one from the fact 



320 APPENDIX IV 

that the revision of the British treaty of 1858 is under 
consideration. The twenty-seventh article of that treaty 
provided that either party might "demand a further re- 
vision of the tariff and of the commercial articles of the 
treaty at the end of ten years; but if no demand be made 
on either side within six months after the end of the first 
ten years, then the tariff shall remain in force for ten years 
more, reckoned from the end of the preceding ten years." 

The thirtieth article of the treaty between China and 
the United States, of 1858, provides that "should at any 
time the Ta-tsing empire grant to any nation, or the 
merchants or citizens of any nation, any right, privilege, 
or favour connected either with navigation, commerce, 
political, and other intercourse, which is not conferred by 
this treaty, such right, privilege, or favour shall at once 
inure to the benefit of the United States, its public officers, 
merchants, and citizens." Thus the United States became 
directly interested in the revision of the British concessions. 

It being well understood that Great Britain would, 
when the time came, demand, among other things, the 
right to navigate the interior waters of the empire with 
steam, the right to construct and to hire warehouses in 
the interior for the storage of goods, and the right to 
work coal-mines, the government of Peking, on the 12th oi 
October, 1867, took steps to get information from the 
different parts of the empire upon the subject of revision. 
Among others, Tseng Kwo-fan, acting governor of the 
provinces of Eaangsu, Nganhwui, and Kiangsi, "a man 
over seventy years of age, and of distinguished reputation 
throughout the empire," received these instructions and 
made, in answer to them, the able report to the copy 
of which, herewith inclosed, I have already called your 
attention. 

Though the work of a conservative mind that clings to 
the traditions of the past and sees few good results in 



APPENDIX IV 321 

change, it is moderate and temperate, and must be con- 
ceded to be, from the Chinese stand-point, a not unwise 
view of the subject. With all its conservatism it is easy 
to trace in it the enlarging and modifying influences of 
contact with the West. 

In substance, however, it recommends the Emperor's 
advisers not to grant the important new concessions 
asked for by the government of Great Britain. 

In November last the expected demands were made on 
the part of Great Britain by Sir Rutherford Alcock in a 
personal interview with Prince Kung and some of the other 
ministers. They were made in strong language, as neces- 
sary to the proper enjoyment of the rights conceded by 
the treaty of 1858, and the Chinese government was 
warned in advance of the probable course Great Britain 
would pursue in case of refusal. The American minister 
gave Sir Rutherford Alcock the support of his presence 
at the interview, and afterward received from Sir Ruther- 
ford full copies of an account of it, which was drawn up 
in the British legation and transmitted to Prince Kung. 
I inclose copies of these documents. 

Prince Kung, on his part, soon replied in a dignified and 
moderate way to the peremptory demands of Sir Ruther- 
ford Alcock. He admitted the substantial accuracy of 
Sir Rutherford's account of the interview. He said that 
China and Great Britain could not be coerced into a sim- 
ilarity, neither could either wholly adopt the usages of 
the other. He deprecated the entire submission of China 
to the demands of the foreign merchants. He denied 
that there had been wilful violations of the treaty. He 
stated, in detail, many points in which China is prepared 
to make concessions, which will, he thinks, give to the 
foreign merchants all they ought to ask. But to admit 
steamers on the interior lakes and rivers, to establish 
hongs, and to carry on mining operations in the interior, 



322 APPENDIX IV 

will, in the judgment of the prince, be so distasteful to 
the people that it will be impracticable for the government 
to attempt to carry out the terms of such a concession 
should it be made; and Great Britain, in that case, would 
have just cause to upbraid China for bad faith. 

To the representation that these concessions would be 
beneficial to China, the prince replies that a good physi- 
cian ascertains the condition of his patient before deciding 
on the remedies, and intimates that he knows the condi- 
tion of China better than Sir Rutherford Alcock does; and 
he closes by furnishing the British envoy with a memo- 
randum of the basis for a revision which will be accept- 
able to the Chinese government. I inclose copies of these 
papers. 

As Mr. Browne had, in pursuance of the co-operative 
policy, interfered personally and in writing on behalf of 
the British claim for a revision. Prince Kung, about the 
same time, addressed a note to him, of which I inclose a 
copy. 

The basis for a revision, which was proposed by the 
Chinese government, conceded the opening of landing 
stages on the Yangtse at points to be agreed upon; the 
working of mines in the vicinity of one or more of the 
treaty ports; the right of inland navigation by vessels 
not propelled by steam, this restriction to cease when 
Chinese use vessels propelled by steam; a steam-tug on 
the Poyang Lake; and the free right to travel through- 
out the land and to hire lodgings and accommodations 
for produce or goods. 

Mr. Ross Browne, who sympathised and co-operated 
with the British minister throughout the negotiations, ap- 
pears to think that the points gained may become of im- 
portance as a starting-point for negotiations hereafter. I 
inclose you a copy of his letter to Sir Rutherford Alcock 
on the subject. 



APPENDIX IV 323 

The British minister at Washington, on the 9th day of 
June last, notified the United States of the decision of her 
Majesty's government on this subject, by which it would 
appear that they have decided to accept the situation 
and wait quietly the operation of the causes which are 
worldng in the Chinese mind. I inclose a copy of an ex- 
tract from a letter from the board of trade, which has been 
sent to Sir Rutherford Alcock for his guidance. Such 
course strikes me as wiser than the more vigorous policy 
which Sir Rutherford Alcock seems to have contemplated. 
The points gained may not be as important as could be 
desired, yet they have been gained peaceably, by negotia- 
tion, and are yielded by China as a right flowing legiti- 
mately and necessarily from former treaties. 

It certainly looks, on the face of this correspondence, 
as if the conduct of the Emperor's ministers had been 
inspired from the first by a sense of duty, by a desire 
to observe good faith toward the western powers, and 
by a willingness to extend commercial relations with 
those powers, when they felt that they could do so 
without prejudice to their own position and without in- 
jury to the people whose government was intrusted to 
them. 

I will not dwell upon the obvious difficulty of inoculat- 
ing new ideas upon such a people, nor upon the evident 
fact that intelligent statesmen like Prince Kung and his 
associates measure those difficulties quite up to their full 
value. 

Every consideration, from whatever point of view, leads 
me to believe that it is neither wise nor just to force the 
Emperor's advisers into a position of hostility so long as 
we have cause to think that they are willing to accept 
the present situation and to march forward, although with 
the prudence taught them by a Chinese education. You 
will undoubtedly meet Mr, Burlingame and his associates 



324 APPENDIX IV 

in Berlin. You will, if you please, ascertain from him 
whether he has definite information as to the intentions 
of the ministry at Peking. Unless it shall appear that they 
have already decided not to ratify the treaty of 1868, or 
unless you shall be satisfied that such will be their decision, 
and that the policy inaugurated by Mr. Burlingame is to 
be reversed, you will render him and his associates what- 
ever assistance you can in securing the co-operation of 
North Germany in the new Chinese pohcy. You will also 
doubtless have an opportunity to impress upon Mr. Bur- 
lingame the importance to China of an early ratification 
of the treaties. I have stated already that the President 
has no solicitude as to the purpose of the Emperor's ad- 
visers in that respect. But he thinks it would be well to 
have defined in a permanent law, as soon as possible, the 
relations that are hereafter to exist between the United 
States and China. 

Many considerations call for this beside those which 
-may be deduced from what has gone before in this instruc- 
tion. Every month brings thousands of Chinese emigrants 
to the Pacific coast. Already they have crossed the great 
mountains, and are beginning to be found in the interior 
of the continent. By their assiduity, patience, and fidel- 
ity, and by their intelligence, they earn the good-will and 
confidence of those who employ them. We have good 
reason to think that this thing will continue and increase. 
On the other hand, in China there will be an increase in 
the resident American and European population, not by 
any means commensurate with the growth of the Chinese 
emigration to this country, but corresponding with the 
growth of our country, with the development of its re- 
sources on the Pacific slope, and with the new position in 
the commerce of the world which it takes with the com- 
pletion of the Pacific Railroad. These foreigners settling 
in China, occupying the various quarters assigned to them, 



APPENDIX IV 325 

exercising municipal rights over these quarters by virtue 
of land regulations, either made by them or for them by 
their home governments, cease to be an aggressive element 
in China, when once the principles of the treaty of July, 
1868, are promulgated as the law hereafter to regulate the 
relations between Christendom and that ancient empire. 
You will also say to Mr. Burlingame that, while the Presi- 
dent cordially gives his adhesion to the principles of the 
treaty of 1868, and while he will, should that instrument 
be ratified by China, cause it to be faithfully observed by 
the United States, yet he earnestly hopes that the advisers 
of his Majesty the Emperor may soon see their way clear 
to counsel the granting of some concessions similar to 
those asked for by Sir Rutherford Alcock and Mr. Ross 
Browne. He will not assume to judge whether the temper 
of the people of China will or will not at present justify 
their rulers in doing so; but he thinks that he may, with- 
out impropriety, say, that when it can be done without 
disturbing the good order of the empire, the results must 
be eminently favourable to the welfare and wellbeing of 
the Chinese people. And he trusts that the statesmen of 
China, enlightened by the experience of other nations, will 
hasten at the earliest moment, when in their judgment it 
can safely be done, to respond to the friendly feeling and 
good wishes of the United States by moderating the re- 
strictions which fetter the commerce of the great empire 
over whose destinies they preside. He relies upon Mr. 
Burlingame and his associates to impress upon their chiefs 
at home that the views of such men as Tseng Kwo-fan, 
however honest, are delusive; that experience, patent be- 
fore them in every country through which they travel, 
has shown them that the evils which seem to be dreaded 
by the oriental rulers do not follow the free use of steam 
and of the telegraph; but that, while these inventions im- 
prove the condition of all ranks in the community which 



326 APPENDIX IV 

uses them, their greatest meliorating influence is felt among 
the labouring classes. 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

Hamilton Fish. 

N. B. — Since writing the foregoing instructions, I have 
received from Mr. Burlingame a telegraphic dispatch dated 
August 31, 1869, in which he says: "I have received a dis- 
patch from the Chinese government expressing strongly 
their satisfaction with, and acceptance of, the treaty ne- 
gotiated at Washington." 



V 

MR. GEORGE F. SEWARD TO MR. FISH 

Washington, April 22, 1870. 
(Received April 30.) 
Sir: It is well known that the principles on which our 
intercourse with China has for many years been con- 
ducted have been clearly defined by the mission of Mr. 
Burlingame, and that this demonstration of them has 
drawn forth grave remonstrances from the mass of for- 
eigners on the spot. The principles referred to appear 
authoritatively in the Seward-Burlingame treaty and the 
Clarendon-Burlingame correspondence; the views of the 
merchants in the addresses which they presented to Mr. 
Ross Browne. 

I may state the former as follows: The United States 
and Great Britain desire to acknowledge the perfect in- 
dependence and general sovereignty of China within her 
own borders, and to conform their intercourse with her 
to the usual courses,^ that is to say, they will respect her 
territory and they will not use force or threats of force 
to urge her on in the path of progress, nor will they allow 
force to be used in the settlement of disputes and claims, 
excepting as they would when dealing with a Western state. 

To these fundamental principles the merchants take ex- 
ception at length. The sum of these objections is founded 

I I have not chosen to dwell here on the fact that the existing treaties 
do impair the sovereignty of China; they have been made and accepted, 
and until China complains of them, or they are otherwise shown to be 
unnecessary, impolitic, or wrong, we need not greatly discuss them. 
The proposition as stated touches only matters not dealt with in the 
treaties or affected by them. 

327 



328 APPENDIX V 

in the following sentences, which I extract from the docu- 
ments mentioned: 

"We believe that not only is there a right on the part 
of Western states to insist on steps that will further the 
cause of civilisation in China, but a clear duty in that 
direction; and that the advancement of China without 
anarchy and rebellion cannot be had by waiting until her 
own government is content to move. Lord Clarendon has 
laid down rules of action for our ministers and consuls and 
our community, which would prove entirely inadequate if 
any crisis occurred demanding extraordinary measures." 

The questions thus stated may be defined as follows: 

1st. How may Western states best promote the cause 
of civilisation and good government in China? 

2nd. How may they best protect the legitimate inter- 
ests of their peoples in that empire? 

The one may be concisely termed the question of prog- 
ress, the other that of dealing with the central government. 
I shall treat them separately and in the order above given. 

When the merchants say that Western states have the 
right and add that it is their duty, " to insist on steps that 
will further the cause of civilisation in China," they seem 
to go a long way. If it is their right they may support 
that right by force of arms. If it is their duty it may be 
their duty to use arms. There was a time when European 
potentates defended the claims of discoveries to and over 
great districts and the people inhabiting them. Discovery 
was enough to vest the title to sovereignty, and, lest the 
two greatest defenders of the faith should thus come into 
collision, the outside world was divided between them. 

To Spain was awarded the regions of eternal youth, 
which the fancy of the age believed to exist in the golden 
West. The East, scarcely inferior to Europe in wealth 
and civilisation, was awarded to the mariners of Portugal. 
France and England as well adopted the theory, and con- 



APPENDIX V 329 

tentions arose out of it which led even to acts of war and 
woe. To this day the nations of Europe would not hesi- 
tate to assume jurisdiction over islands of the sea, or of 
districts not already taken possession of by Western states 
or advanced in power and civilisation. It is only a few 
years since one of the greatest men of France, M. Guizot, 
then secretary of foreign affairs, in explaining the cir- 
cumstances under which the French mission to China of 
1844, a peaceful one, was being sent out, declared that if 
the interests of France should demand it the government 
would not hesitate to seize an island on the coast of China. 
At a later date France has pushed conquests in Cochin 
China. Russia is at this moment extending her domains 
in Asia. England never fails for an excuse when it is de- 
sirable to assume authority over the outlying states of 
her Indian territory. Even America, when it suited her 
purpose, asked for access to the ports of Japan. She used 
soft words, but a great fleet gave emphasis to them. 

In fact, moderation has ever been observed when there 
has been the ability to command respect. When this has 
not existed the interests, or supposed interests, of greater 
states have never halted. Conquest and aggrandisement 
have been the rule, and the observers of the rule have not 
yet disappeared. 

It is true that generally the purposes of Western states 
are at the present time more or less cloaked and covered 
over. When it was the aim of Napoleon to extend the 
Latin power, he waited until Mexico seemed to ask for a 
foreign ruler. When Great Britain wished to open sev- 
eral of the ports of China in 1839, the seizure of a quantity 
of opium was made the excuse for a war which accom- 
plished the result. No concealment was made, however, 
when, in 1857, it was concluded that to sustain friendly 
relations with China access to the capital was indispensa- 
ble. Townsend Harris argued with the Japanese for priv- 



330 APPENDIX V 

ileges broader than those granted to Commodore Perry, 
urging that what he asked as a favour would soon be 
demanded from behind the hostile armaments of Eng- 
land and France. Nor are the advocates of the use of 
force destitute of arguments. It is not well to attribute 
the movements of the mercantile classes in China, for in- 
stance, in the direction of progress, to self-interest alone. 
The merchants know full well that they are likely to be 
benefited by the extension of steam navigation, the open- 
ing of coal and other mines, the construction of railroads 
and telegraphs. But it is when they come to consider 
that these measures are desirable chiefly in the native in- 
terests, and are persistently rejected by the government, 
that their belief rises to the height of strong political con- 
viction, and they lose no opportunity to impress their 
ideas upon the world. 

I have lived for many years among foreigners in China. 
I believe that no higher-minded, more honourable mer- 
chants than those engaged there can be found in any land. 
I doubt whether the members of any mercantile class in 
the world are superior to them in origin and education. 
You will have noticed the ability and earnestness with 
which they discuss the great problems working out on 
the Asiatic coast. The views held may often be mis- 
taken ones; but this occurs through no lack of good dis- 
position. It is rather due to the special circumstances 
by which they are affected and the intensity of their con- 
victions. 

It has not been my fortune to agree always in their 
views. I have no hesitation, however, in paying them the 
tribute which I do. I conceive that I am acting wisely 
when I review my own in deference to their opinions. 
And highly as I respected the speaker, and much as I 
sympathise with the generous views which he has enforced 
in America and Europe, I deprecate Mr. Burlingame's 



APPENDIX V 331 

words when he calls them "opium dealers." In truth, 
foreign merchants in China are not opium dealers. The 
opium traffic is confined to a small number of mercantile 
houses and to Asiatic traders. From it the mass of mer- 
chants are as free as they are from participation in the 
coolie trade or in the African slave trade. So far as the 
acquaintance with the soberly held ideas of the leaders 
of commerce is concerned, I esteem my residence at Shang- 
hai more favourable than life at the isolated capital of 
China. I attribute not a few of Mr. Burlingame's dis- 
paraging remarks to the fact that he lived at the capital, 
and only at rare intervals came in contact with his coun- 
trymen at the ports. 

I confess that I should think less of Western civilisa- 
tion and of Western manhood if it were not pushing and 
aggressive in China. Take the average American or Eng- 
lishman used to well-kept roads and streets, to well-policed 
towns, to the comforts, conveniences, and advantages of 
steamships, telegraphs, and railroads, to all the benefits 
of lands where private rights are perfectly respected, edu- 
cation is diffused, and the blessings of a high civilisation 
are found, and put him down in China, where there is not 
one carriage road; where there are no sewers nor lamps in 
the towns; where telegraphs and railroads are unknown, 
and steamers only where foreigners have forced them, a 
country which seems to possess the fewest possible ele- 
ments of accord with the enterprising West, and he would 
be unworthy of the Anglo-Saxon blood which runs in his 
veins if he should teach himself the Chinese habit of 
thought, and sit down to believe, with the immobile mass 
around him, that whatever is is best. I can use no stronger 
language than that of Mr. Browne, when he says: 

"Whatever errors may be committed through miscon- 
ception of facts or excess of zeal, the cause of progress 
is one which appeals to the highest sentiments of the 



332 APPENDIX V 

Christian world. I look upon the movements, therefore, as 
abounding in promises for the future. The best friends 
of China will undoubtedly be those who can induce her to 
strengthen her organisation and render herself able and 
worthy to maintain her position," 

If it is asked, then, what are the arguments of this press- 
ing mercantile class in favour of the use or the demonstra- 
tion of force, the answer is ready: "The advancement of 
China without anarchy and rebellion," they say, "cannot 
be had by waiting until her government is ready to move." 
"The presence of foreigners is a protection and blessing 
to the people; this presence is their only chance of im- 
provement save through desolating wars. It is in all 
probability the chief cause of the existence of the pres- 
ent government, and perhaps of any government in the 
country," 

This idea was expressed by me, more guardedly, how- 
ever, six months before the date of the memorial {vide 
my dispatch, No. 345) : 

"It is manifest that the growing intercourse between 
Chinese and foreigners in this and in other countries is 
bringing new forces into action in this empire. We have 
already seen Japan revolutionised in consequence of similar 
intercourse. The effect on the immensely greater mass of 
Chinese society is slower but very certain. The people 
are moving, and unless the government keeps with them, 
or in advance, new forms of administration or variations 
of existing forms will be sought in a revolutionary way." 

I confess that when I wrote the above I entertained the 
idea that the government would keep in advance, or, at 
least, with the movements of its people. This belief had 
been shared by leading foreigners in China. Mr. Hart, 
inspector-general of maritime customs, who lives at the 
capital, and whose relations with the government are more 
intimate than those of any other foreigner, shared it. Mr. 



APPENDIX V 333 

Burlingame was full of it. Sir Rutherford Alcock en- 
tertained it so far that he supported the mission which 
was to go out expressly to gain the assurances of Western 
powers that they would bide China's time and not force 
progress on her. We hear now from Mr. Hart, from Sir 
Rutherford, from the other ministers, from the merchants, 
and from Mr. Browne, that this was a mistake. 

Mr. Hart says : 

" Some forty officials in the provinces, and perhaps ten 
at Peking, have a glimmering notion of what the foreigner 
means when he speaks of progress; but of those ten, not 
one is prepared to enter boldly on a career of progress or 
to take the consequences of even a feeble initiative." 

Sir R. Alcock says: 

"There is no evidence here of a desire for progress. If 
any hopes are built upon its existence, therefore, I fear 
there is nothing but disappointment in store for those 
who indulge in them. Projectors of telegraphic lines, 
railroads, and other plans for the sudden development of 
the resources of this country are but losing their time, 
while the government have shown no disposition to enter- 
tain their projects. I think it is in the interest of all who 
are so occupied that they should know the truth, and not 
be deluded by false hopes and expectations of changes 
which are still in the dim distance." 

Mr. Browne says: 

"All that the rulers of this empire desire is to be left 
free to work out their own destiny in their own way, and 
that is simply retrogression and relapse into barbarism. 
They make small concessions to avert greater ones; the 
whole struggle is against making any at all. I state this 
not in the way of deprecation, but as an incontrovertible 
fact which we are bound to confront. It is a subject for 
sympathy rather than complaint. A vast empire with 
an industrious and inoffensive population is in many re- 



334 APPENDIX V 

spects worthy of esteem in maintaining an unequal strug- 
gle to preserve its ancient systems against the combined 
powers of the world." 

This is unmistakable language. And it is not different 
from the declarations which reach us from other sources. 
From the merchants, the professional men, and the officials 
at the ports, even from the highly intelligent class of for- 
eigners who are managing the maritime customs depart- 
ment of the empire, we hear the same language, "China 
never has, and never will progress except under pressure." 

A distinction is to be held in view here. Mr. Burlin- 
game asserts with emphasis that China does progress. 
He recites as evidence that foreign trade increases from 
year to year. He quotes the fact that the Chinese are 
building several arsenals. He calls attention to the exist- 
ence of the customs establishments. The so-called Peking 
University points his moral. In glowing language he de- 
clares that China invites Christendom "to plant the shin- 
ing cross on every hill and in every valley of her broad 
domain." I hold with him that China is progressing. 
But the case is not such as persons not acquainted with 
the circumstances would understand from his language. 

There is, in truth, progress in China. It is, however, 
that which has been forced on the empire and does not 
come from a spontaneous desire for improved methods. 
Trade develops there as it will in any land where scope 
for effort is given. We have forced China to give us her 
teas and silks, subject to certain defined rates of duty. 
We have forced her to accept opium, cotton goods, etc., 
subject to similar duties. The law of supply and demand 
has been strong enough to work out the development 
which we have seen. The government has done nothing, 
excepting, of necessity, to foster trade. It is not many 
years since the governor of the province of Kiang-si was 
dismissed from office because he said: "I conceive it my 



APPENDIX V 335 

duty to weigh well the advantage and disadvantage of 
this or that order of proceeding, and if any measure be 
beneficial to China and practicable, and does not violate 
law, I will assuredly not abide in the smallest degree by 
standing prejudices." But these are the only works of 
progress which they are undertaking, and one object they 
have in view is to strengthen existing institutions for a 
possible conflict with foreigners. The customs establish- 
ment is one of the most promising features of the prog- 
ress of China. This was, however, urged on China by 
France and England to protect the lien which they had 
acquired upon the revenues of the state, and China, find- 
ing that she derived a better result from the aid of for- 
eigners than she could when only natives were employed, 
and perhaps considering that she might pit foreigners 
against foreigners, has retained the service and extended 
it. The Peking University can only be said to have an 
existence. Missionaries may, in virtue of treaty stipula- 
tions, travel and reside in any part of the empire. These 
stipulations were, however, wrung from the Chinese by 
war, and they are deterred from discrediting them by 
the fear of war. Unoffending missionaries are frequently 
driven from places where they have attempted to locate 
themselves, and the record of murdered ones is a long one. 
Instead of a picture of hopefulness, the merchants there 
draw of China one of despair. "We claim," they say, 
"that China as she stands is as low in civilisation as she 
is in wealth and power; that her history teaches us little 
worth knowing, except maxims of morality, long reduced 
by Western nations to actual practice, but by China 
neglected and forgotten; that her present state, so far 
from being an example, is a warning of the results of a 
false system and a vicious policy." And again they say: 
"It is almost impossible for us to convey to our fellow- 
countrymen at home a just idea of the utter inability of 



336 APPENDIX V 

the Chinese to comprehend any motives for forbearance 
other than our own powerlessness or a fear of their grow- 
ing strength. It is our candid opinion that if the 
British and American governments were in a position to 
estimate all the dangers that are involved in their new 
policy, they would abandon it at once, in a state of alarm 
at its probable consequences." 

If we grant that the merchants and the others quoted 
are right in their estimate of the Chinese disposition and 
character, and if we acknowledge the force of the descrip- 
tions which we continually read of the imperfection of 
Chinese systems of thought, of religion, and of government, 
it will be difficult to refrain from giving unqualified sym- 
pathy to their ideas. If China is weak and worthless and 
perverse, we must say, with the American moralist, "that 
while Western governments are bound to act a friendly, 
just, and generous part toward China, they cannot forego 
the advantage of the moral influence of their greater ma- 
terial powers"; and, with the British memorialist, "It is 
our earnest wish that when you [Mr. Browne] return to 
the United States you may endeavour to enlighten the 
public mind upon the real issues that are raised by the 
existence of foreign intercourse with China; and upon the 
most efficient means of introducing Western civilisation 
into this vast empire"; and, with Mr. Browne, "Instead 
of attributing to the Chinese either capacities or motives 
irreconciled with their whole history, and with their pres- 
ent condition and limited intelligence, it is our duty to 
enlighten and elevate them. But it is not by pandering 
to their superstitions and their weaknesses that this is to 
be done. The strong hand of pressure may be more hu- 
mane in the end than flattering." 

I cannot regard the condition of China so hopeless as 
do the high authorities I have quoted. What are the 
facts? 



APPENDIX V 337 

In the year 1840 there was no contact between China 
and the people of the West, excepting the very Hmited 
intercourse carried on by a few merchants at Canton. 
The empire was self-contained. To the northward were 
great deserts; to the westward, impassable mountains; 
to the southward, vast stretches of tropical jungles; and 
to the eastward, the Pacific. Within these boundaries 
dwelt a people whose numbers were estimated at 400,- 
000,000. The neighbouring states and districts — ^Corea, 
Loochoo, Assam, Siam, Burmah, Thibet, Mantchooria, 
Mongolia — paid voluntary tribute to her. The Emperor 
was surrounded with the halo of deity. What wonder 
can we have that the state, prosperous beyond any of her 
neighbours, should be called "The Central Flowery King- 
dom," and that her Emperor should assume to have re- 
ceived the "commands of Heaven to sway, with paternal 
care, the peoples of all lands?" 

The troubles of the merchants at Canton in that year 
brought on the war of 1842, which led to the opening of 
four other ports to trade, viz. : Amoy, Foochow, Ningpo, 
and Shanghai. But the access of foreigners to the em- 
pire was confined to those ports. There were given no 
rights to reside or even travel in the interior. Diplomatic 
representatives were forbidden to go to the capital. Mat- 
ters went on thus for fifteen years, when at last the treaties 
of Tientsin, exacted by arms, gave foreigners rights which 
were broad in comparison with those they had previously 
held, but were still far short of the privileges which are 
extended in any Western state. Practically those treaties 
confine the foreign merchants to a dozen or so ports, and 
beyond these the intercourse of foreigners with natives is 
occasional and inconsiderable. The treaties of Tientsin 
have existed twelve years. They take away from China 
a part of her natural sovereignty. They give, in some 
directions, greater privileges to the foreigner than the 



338 APPENDIX V 

native has possessed. They introduce into the land an 
alien race, bent on trade and on proselyting plans. They 
introduce, or seem to do so, an obnoxious drug, which de- 
stroys the stamina of the people; introduce it in such 
quantities that the state can barely produce tea and silk 
enough — valuable commodities — to pay for it. 

I assume, and the candid observer at a distance will not 
be likely to dispute the fact, that if China, during these 
twelve years, has even passably well discharged her duties 
under the treaties; if she has even passably well accom- 
modated herself to her new, very strange, and very irk- 
some relations, she has done much. And if she has not 
egregiously failed in the performance of her new obliga- 
tions, and has only partially accommodated herself to 
her new relations, I consider it reasonable to hope that she 
will soon begin to appreciate the benefits which free in- 
tercourse with Western states is sure to bring to her, and 
to expect that at no very distant day we shall see tele- 
graphs and railroads stretching everywhere across the 
land, steam-vessels plying on all her waters, coal and 
other mines yielding forth desired riches, and the whole 
land rousing itself from a lethargy which has seemed that 
of ultimate decay. 

I am prepared to say that I believe now, as I did two 
years ago, and as did the most prominent men in China at 
that time, that she will attain peaceably these results. I 
believe that it will be so, but more than this I cannot say. 
We cannot unravel the future and learn what is mingled 
in its web. We can only exercise our judgment as to what 
is the tendency and direction of existing forces and the 
character of results to be worked out under novel condi- 
tions. 

If China were a state now as she was formerly, self- 
contained and self -poised, if no forces were at work within 
her borders excepting those originated by her own char- 



APPENDIX V 339 

acter and disposition, nor any outside interference or inter- 
course were to be expected, I should say that she might 
go on in the future much as she has in the past. Dynasty 
might succeed dynasty, periods of misrule and anarchy 
might give place to those of good government and order, 
to be succeeded again by eras of pain and difficulty. The 
great pendulum of time might continue to swing backward 
and forward, bringing with it, as heretofore, prosperity 
and prostration. That has been the course of events in 
China for many centuries, and so might continue indefi- 
nitely. 

But there are other forces at work in China than those 
original with her people. These forces are of the strong- 
est, and they are so defended and supported that they are 
left very free to work out normal results. The bad dis- 
positions of rulers may retard, but they cannot stay them; 
the natural qualities of the people may hinder, but they 
cannot bar their course. They are forces which will ac- 
commodate themselves greatly to existing systems if not 
opposed, but if blind efforts are made to check them they 
will sweep away whatever opposes. Institutions of gov- 
ernment, nay, whole races of men, will go down before 
them hereafter, as they have heretofore, whenever the inev- 
itable is not recognised but blindly combated. 

Let us consider the advantage these forces have in 
China. 

The treaties as they stand give the people of Western 
nations the following privileges : 

1. To approach with their ships, to land or lade mer- 
chandise, to reside, etc., etc., etc., at twelve ports on the 
coast. 

2. To navigate the Yangtse River so far as Hankow, 
six hundred miles, and to reside, etc., etc., etc., at that and 
at three other cities on the river. 

3. To travel under a system of passports in the vessels 



340 APPENDIX V 

or other conveyances of the country, for purposes of busi- 
ness or of pleasure, to all parts of the empire. 

4. To send or take foreign goods into or bring foreign- 
owned produce from the interior under a system of transit 
passes. The utiUty of this is that they are thus enabled 
to pay a certain definite commutation, fixed at one-half 
of the external tariff charge, in lieu of the taxes which 
are levied, under the peculiar economy of the empire, on 
merchandise in transit, at barriers established along the 
rivers, canals, and highways. 

Under these treaties, communities of foreigners have 
grown up at all the places where they are allowed to live, 
and the trade of the empire centres chiefly at these points. 
The carrying trade between the ports and cities opened 
has been transferred to foreign bottoms. The Chinese in 
their most distant marts have come to know, and more or 
less to use, foreign fabrics, and these are so much esteemed 
that in some districts, at least, whatever is best is known, 
not as "superfine," but as "foreign." They are continu- 
ally witnessing the voyages along their coast or on their 
rivers of the sailing craft of the West, with which their 
own vessels compare so unfavourably, and of great steam- 
ers which cannot but be regarded by them as marvels of 
human ingenuity. They see at the ports that foreigners 
live in houses of imposing size and appearance, in cir- 
cumstances of ease, convenience, and luxury unknown 
in their modest dwellings. They observe that these for- 
eign communities are well ordered, and must mark with 
astonishment the perfected arrangements of the streets 
and of the wharves and docks. They have occasion to 
go into the foreign courts of law and learn that the maxims 
of morality and of fair-dealing taught by their own sages, 
but nowhere in their land greatly observed, are therein 
enforced. They witness great vessels of war, any one of 
which would be able to combat an army, lying quietly ia 



APPENDIX V 341 

their ports, a spectacle, elsewhere unknown to them, of 
power held in check by perfect moderation. They see the 
forces of foreign states leagued with their own to suppress 
internal disorders. They see an important branch of the 
national revenues honestly administered by foreign em- 
ployees. They find that, when taught, they can themselves 
manage ships, steamers, and machinery, and can even 
construct them. 

The forces which have been thus fostered and defended, 
and have accomplished so much, are, then, those which, 
proceeding out of high stages of civilisation, have effected 
amelioration in the condition of the human race in Eu- 
rope and America, and are destined yet to arouse from 
their lethargy or overthrow the Asiatic and African races. 
There is no staying them. Whatever may be the manner 
in which results will be worked out in the various lands of 
the globe, that those results will be accomplished no one 
in whose veins courses the quicker blood of the West 
entertains a doubt. 

The Chinaman is noted, moreover, for his sobriety, his 
industry, and his peaceableness. No people, excepting 
one which needs the least control, could present to the 
world the spectacle which China has for centuries. In 
the West, until now, the existence of greatly extended 
states has been impossible. China, without other than 
the simplest means of communication, and unblessed by a 
good government, has been one and undivided. Without 
extraordinary branches of industry, and no external com- 
merce, she has given her people the means of sustenance. 
A more quiet peasantry does not exist. And while the 
people are thus docile, careful, and thrifty, the theory of 
government is in many respects admirable, and men of in- 
telligence and breadth of views, according to their lights, 
exercise, or do from time to time exercise, the sovereign 
control. 



342 APPENDIX V 

It would require much time to offer an explanation 
of the Chinese governmental system. It is certainly, in 
theory, despotic. Practically, however, it is liberal. The 
Emperor represents all authority and power. The vice- 
roys are his lieutenants; they are sent to their respective 
districts, instructed to collect the revenues and to admin- 
ister the laws; they are given no imposing military sup- 
port. The task assigned them is to govern so that the 
ancient systems may be supported and the people made 
content. Their conduct is not greatly scrutinised so long 
as no murmurs come up. But when the people complain, 
the unsuccessful ruler must make way for another. The 
result is a system which is democratic in its working, if 
not in its salient features, and one well calculated to bring 
good men to the management of affairs. 

As to the ability of the leading men in the state, I need 
only to allude to what has been said of late by such men 
as Gushing, Bruce, and Burlingame, to refer to the his- 
tory and literature of China, and to recall the names 
of Confucius and Meng-tse, Genghis-Khan and Kublai, 
Kang-hi and Kien-lung. Of a state thus constituted, it 
is premature to declare that she possesses no capacity to 
assimilate herself to new conditions. 

But however bad may be the condition of China, how- 
ever necessary for her own salvation it is that she should 
move forward in a career of .progress, and however little 
hope there may be that she will move without pressure, 
that is to say, without the use of threats or force, fulfilling 
all the conditions of the arguments which are advanced 
by the merchants and by Mr. Browne, I assume that nei- 
ther the United States nor England, nor any other state, 
will use force or threats. 

It is our disposition to deal with China as a sister and 
sovereign empire. We have made treaties of amity and 
commerce with her. We send to her diplomatic represent- 



APPENDIX V 343 

atlves and receive hers. We have come to consider that 
the rules on which we conduct intercourse with the states 
of Christendom shall be those which shall guide us in our 
intercourse with China. We are led up to this conclusion 
by the simplest reasoning. The states of the West have 
learned nothing of China since they gained access to the 
Tartar capital which has been of sufficient significance to 
shake their sense of duty and their preference in this re- 
gard. It is easy to deride the advanced liberalism of the 
age, and to stigmatise the policy which acknowledges 
broadly the right of any people to work out its destiny 
freely and independently, as a deliberate sinking of prac- 
tical ideas and methods, and there may be great truth in 
the criticisms. But the fact remains that one of the doc- 
trines of the political faith of the age is that all interven- 
tion is harmful and should be avoided. We may advise 
respectfully and discreetly, or we may warn earnestly, 
but we must confine ourselves to representation, unless 
our rights are touched. Nor can I imagine that if this is 
so, and the use of power is forbidden us by the spirit of 
the age, we can satisfy ourselves or retain our dignity if 
we use threats, direct or implied. 

Indeed, I consider that such pressure as the merchants 
and Mr. Browne advocate is virtually impossible. A Brit- 
ish minister using it would be discountenanced by the 
executive, or, should the executive by any chance support 
him, Parliament would not be unlikely to expel the execu- 
tive. The same result cannot happen in America, but no 
administration careful to respect the sentiments of the 
people, as wise administrations ever are, would consent 
to support a representative pursuing such a course. 

This feature of the case has received apparently no 
consideration in China. Men there have seemed to de- 
vote themselves to the elucidation of the problem: What 
policy on the part of Western states would most surely, 



344 APPENDIX V 

rapidly, and safely build up the prosperity of the empire? 
They have forgotten the essential requirements of any 
policy, viz., that it shall conform to the spirit of the age 
and the requirements and limitations of representative 
government. 

The question seems a broad one until we reach this 
point. It narrows at once here. The Western statesman 
will do all that he can touching China when he sets before 
her rulers, discreetly and with tact, the arguments which 
are so ready to his hands in favour of material progress 
and of liberal institutions, and points out the dangers 
which will be incurred by the government in holding 
rigidly to old ideas and practices, while the people are 
being educated by contact with foreigners to more liberal 
and advanced views. 

I have so far kept in view the ideas of the merchants as 
to progress in China; shown what those ideas are; indi- 
cated that they are, or may not be, altogether in accord- 
ance with the facts; and that, whether so or not, they are 
not likely to receive support. 

My treatment of the matter which remains to be con- 
sidered will not be different, and my conclusions will not 
be less positive, although in this, as in the question of 
progress, I shall endeavour to do as full justice to the 
arguments advanced on the mercantile side as I can, 
having reasonable regard to brevity. 

The policy of dealing with the central government is 
the one supported by those who believe that, having trea- 
ties with the government of China, executed on a basis 
of equality, and having representatives at the capital, 
and having ourselves received her representatives, we are 
bound to discuss and settle disputes which cannot be dis- 
posed of by consular negotiations only at the capital, and 
in conference with the imperial authorities. That such 
is the desirable course, I presume no one will be found 



APPENDIX V 345 

hardy enough to deny. The divergence arises on the ques- 
tion whether the pohcy is a practicable one. 

The British memoriahsts say, " Lord Clarendon has laid 
down rules of action for our minister, our consuls, and our 
community, which would prove utterly inadequate if any 
crisis occurred demanding extraordinary measures," and 
"we cannot but admire the unanswerable vindication 
by Sir Rutherford Alcock of his and our views, which is 
contained in his dispatch to Lord Clarendon of the 5 th 
February last." 

Sir Rutherford, then, may be considered the speaker 
for the merchants as well as for himself. Before quoting, 
however, from his dispatch of February, referred to, I 
will briefly state the circumstances which called it forth. 

On the 22d and 23d of August, 1868, a British mission- 
ary named Taylor, and a number of others, men and women, 
also missionaries, who had settled at Yang-chow, near 
Chin-kiang, were attacked by a mob, who had for several 
days threatened them. The houses in which they lived 
were somewhat damaged, and some injuries, fortunately 
none of a grave character, were inflicted on members of 
the mission. The animus of the mob will be seen when 
I state that a house, in the upper rooms of which some 
ladies of the party had taken refuge, was set fire to and 
they were forced to jump from the windows to save them- 
selves from the danger of death by burning. The mis- 
sionaries had been but a few weeks in the city. It would 
appear that they had conducted themselves with discre- 
tion and when the indications of danger became manifest 
they were careful to inform the authorities and to request 
protection. 

On hearing of the difficulty, Mr. Medhurst, British con- 
sul at Shanghai, within whose district Yang-chow lies, an 
officer of deservedly high reputation, and of the longest 
experience, proceeded to the spot and made efforts to 



346 APPENDIX V 

secure the punishment of the offenders, and reparation 
for the damages done and injuries inflicted. He was un- 
successful, and reported the case to his superior at Peking. 
Sir R. Alcock, with his accustomed vigour and rapidity, 
laid the matter before the Foreign Office; with what suc- 
cess may be seen from his own statement, as follows : 

"The result has been so far satisfactory that it has 
been determined to institute a searching and honest in- 
quiry, on the spot, into all the circumstances, and I am 
assured the punishment of those responsible for any wrong 
done shall surely follow, together with compensation to 
the missionaries and their restoration to the places from 
which they have been ejected." 

Sir Rutherford, for reasons which he afterward states, 
did not credit the professions of the Foreign Office, and, 
instead of waiting to learn what the result would be, he 
called upon Admiral Keppel "to give such effective sup- 
port to Mr. Consul Medhurst in the demands he will be 
instructed to make, as may, I think, avert the necessity 
for any more active measures of coercion. Should this 
hope unfortunately not be realised, I am satisfied there is 
no alternative consistent with a due regard for British in- 
terests in China but to direct the consul to place the matter 
in your hands, in order that you may take such further 
measures as shall be found necessary to compel the local 
authorities to meet our demands, and do full justice in 
accordance with the instructions I am assured they will 
receive from the central government." 

In accordance with his instructions, Mr. Medhurst, in 
due season, proceeded to Nanking, the residence of the 
viceroy of the district, with the men-of-war Rodney, Ri- 
naldo, Slaney, Behra, Dove, and Icarus. The first act of 
this fleet was to inform the commander of a Chinese cor- 
vette, the Tien-chi, found at anchor near Nankin, that 
"he must not weigh without permission, on pain of having 



APPENDIX V 347 

a prize crew placed in charge." This was followed by a 
demand for the temporary transfer of the Tien-chi. Mr. 
Medhurst adds: "I need scarcely say that the required 
order was granted without delay," although he tells us 
that the Chinese opposed the demand with "much vehe- 
mence." 

Having completed some preliminary negotiations with 
the viceroy, the fleet dropped down the river to Chin- 
kiang, near Yang-chow, and from there two of the smaller 
vessels, with three hundred marines, proceeded up the 
Grand Canal to the city of Yang-chow itself. The marines 
were landed there and quartered in the city. The nego- 
tiations went forward, the demands were all substantially 
complied with, and Mr. Medhurst and the flotilla returned 
to Shanghai with eclat. 

The British Government, however, conceived that the 
course taken was unsatisfactory, and thus instructed their 
envoy : 

"Mr. Medhurst very properly reported to you from the 
first what had happened to the missionaries, and the course 
which he proposed to pursue; and afterward, when he 
failed in overcoming the reluctance of the viceroy to 
afford redress, he, as in duty bound, placed the matter 
in your hands. 

"You, on your part, very properly called upon the cen- 
tral government to afford redress, and her Majesty's gov- 
ernment are glad to recognise in Prince Kung's letters, 
and your own comments on them, the fullest admission 
on the part of the central government of their responsi- 
bility, and the readiness with which they took measures 
that proved effectual for bringing the local authorities, 
as well as the viceroy of Nanking, to a proper sense of their 
respective duties, the result being that full satisfaction 
was made for the outrage complained of. 

"Thus far the matters followed their proper course. 



348 APPENDIX V 

The central government was appealed to for redress against 
the provincial government, and proved its willingness and 
ability to obtain it. 

"But I will not conceal from you that her Majesty's 
Government would have much preferred that the matter 
should have been left to the action of the central govern- 
ment, subject, of course, to the view which her Majesty's 
Government might take of it, if that action were withheld 
or proved unavailing, than that the aid of her Majesty's 
naval forces should have been invoked in order to bring 
pressure or to inflict punishment on the provincial author- 
ities irrespective of the demand which you had made on 
the central government for redress." 

And afterward sums up as follows: 

"... The active interference of her Majesty's naval 
forces should only be had recourse to in cases of sudden 
emergency and of immediate danger to lives and property; 
but when once the matter is removed for diplomatic dis- 
cussion at Peking, her Majesty's Government should be 
left free to determine, if occasion should arise for doing 
so, what is best to be done to enforce upon the central 
government the obligations not only to observe treaties, 
but to compel the provincial authorities also to observe 
them." 

This brings me to Sir Rutherford's "unanswerable vin- 
dication" of his action, and of his views and those of the 
merchants. Sir Rutherford says : 

"Some shorter and less disastrous mode of settling 
wrongs and disputes at distant ports is as much to be 
desired in the interest of the Chinese nation and govern- 
ment as in that of foreigners, even though it should be 
less strictly accordant with international law and usage. 
Against the disadvantages that attach to local actions, even 
after appeal shall have been made in vain to the govern- 
ment at Peking, and the objections in principle to which all 



APPENDIX V 349 

such extreme courses must be open, both Chinese and for- 
eign powers may wisely, perhaps, set as a counterbalance 
the avoidance of cumulative wrong leading to the neces- 
sity of a war, and entailing costly expenditure on the one 
side and a perilous loss of authority and prestige on the 
other. 

"We need not look to Vattel or Grotius for any sanction 
to such exceptional action, for the simple reason that they 
and all other writers on international law deal with prin- 
ciples in their application to civilised states, recognising 
a mutual obligation, and governed by similar, or at least 
analogous, systems of jurisprudence and polity; but when 
dealing with Oriental races and states, ignorant of all the 
conditions and principles of European polity, a special 
adaptation of those principles is required to meet the 
wholly exceptional character of the situation caused by a 
forced intercourse between races holding totally different 
views of moral obligation and national policy. The broad 
principles of justice, of right and wrong, which underlie 
the international code of nations must be respected every- 
where by civilised states, but an over-scrupulous pedantry 
in adherence to the rules deduced from these, and forming 
the system known in Europe as the law of nations, in deal- 
ing with an Asiatic race like the Chinese, is only calculated 
to do mischief, and bring on the very evils it is intended 
to avert. 

"Some special modification of rules and principles of 
international law, as this is understood and recognised by 
European states, is required in the interest of peace and 
justice. Local authorities must not be allowed, by per- 
sistent misrule and violation of treaties, to bring on their 
country the horrors of war as the sole means of redressing 
the wrong, and the only effective means of preventing 
this, in default of a central government, with adequate 
power, is to make them feel a personal responsibility for 



350 APPENDIX V 

their acts such as their own government ought, but, under 
present conditions, seems quite unable to enforce. The 
knowledge that, sooner or later, if justice is denied and 
instructions from Peking disregarded, to the injury of for- 
eigners, they will have themselves to deal with a foreign 
power they can neither defy nor resist, will soon lead to a 
radical reform in the course of action, and teach them to 
respect treaty obligations for their own sake if they care 
nothing either for treaties or the orders of their own gov- 
ernment. Such a policy, if carried out with judgment and 
moderation by the treaty powers, will act beneficially at 
both ends of the line. The Peking government will be dis- 
posed to take more stringent measures than they other- 
wise would with their provincial officers to enforce respect 
for the rights and interests of foreigners, while the officials 
themselves will become more circumspect not to provoke 
the inevitable issue of conflict with a foreign power, and 
all parties will gain largely thereby. 

"Hitherto the course of affairs has been only too truly 
described by the memorialists from the ports. 

"When any wrong or injustice is suffered by a foreigner 
for which there is no appeal to a public court of justice 
and a written code of laws, if the Chinese local authorities 
are not moved, as is too often the case, by the consul's 
representations, the only recourse is a reference to the 
minister at Peking; and then commences an interminable 
series of references backward and forward — a see-saw of 
correspondence on both sides between the ports and the 
capital — and no final solution is ever arrived at. It 
may be safely affirmed that such is the experience of all 
the foreign representatives. I am assured there is no 
one of these who cannot point to numerous cases which 
have been so treated for a number of years, despite their 
best efforts to secure a better result. 

"Such experience leads infallibly to a conviction that 



APPENDIX V 351 

when treaties have been imposed by force upon an un- 
wilhng government, as all with China have been, they can 
only be upheld by the same means. The diplomatic in- 
strument has no binding power with Chinese rulers when 
its stipulations can be evaded with impunity, or whenever 
it is believed that the force that imposed them is no longer 
extant or available. Diplomacy in such circumstances 
means armed reason. As Carlyle, in his quaint style, 
remarks, 'Diplomacy is clouds, beating your enemies 
on sea and land,' and the only evidence of power or title 
to respect a true Oriental freely recognises. And in order 
that foreign powers may not have to resort to such rude 
instruments for proving their title, it behooves them to 
find means of preventing cumulative violations of treaty, 
since continued impunity brings with it a conviction of 
weakness; for, as I have said on a former occasion, it is 
weakness, or the suspicion of it, which invariably provokes 
aggression, and with Eastern races is a far more fruitful 
cause of bad faith and danger than either force or the 
abuse of it. The desire to avoid complications and wars 
in the Far East should suggest, not an unreasoning recoil 
from the assertion of treaty rights from fear of the troubles 
it may bring, but a steadfast adherence to such conditions 
of intercourse as experience has proved to be best 
adapted to insure respect for engagements." 

Sir Rutherford then states his belief : 

"That well-combined measures of pressure, showing, 
by unmistakable signs, both the will and the immediate 
power to enforce, if needs be, demands for redress, per- 
sistently denied after reference to Peking, and promises 
of action from the government, will never fail if brought 
to bear judiciously against the local authorities, however 
high their position." 

But in order that this pressure may be irresistible, Sir 
Rutherford condemns unauthorised action, that is to say, 



352 APPENDIX V 

the independent action of consuls and commanders of 
vessels of war, and insists that the power to exercise pres- 
sure should be given only to the diplomatic representative 
of the government. "Thus guarded," he says, "there is 
little to fear from any abuse of power, and much to hope 
from its discretionary exercise being intrusted to the rep- 
resentative at Peking, should necessity arise." 

During the time that the Yang-chow matter was going 
forward I could not but feel that a mistaken policy was 
being carried out, and I took the liberty, which perhaps 
was justified by my long experience in China, to express 
my views to Mr. Browne; the substance of my argument 
was that our relations with China are of such character 
as to bind us to appeal for the settlement of difficulties 
to the government at Peking; that there was no good 
reason to doubt the ability of the government to give 
redress in that and all similar cases; that the policy of 
appealing to the government did indeed stand discredited, 
many appeals for justice having been unsuccessful, but 
that it was perhaps true that the appeals had been faint 
or otherwise not forcible. I then recited the circumstances 
of the empire when the foreign minister went to the capital 
and for several years thereafter, pointed out the straits 
and difficulties into which the administration was placed 
by reason of the rebellions existing in various districts, 
and the novel character of its relations with Western states, 
and showed how the whole situation had called for a 
policy of generous forbearance and support from the min- 
isters. I urged that this forbearance had, perhaps, in the 
best spirit, but unfortunately, been carried so far as to 
engender a feeling of irresponsibility on the part of the 
government, and of irritation on the part of the merchants 
who, finding their grievances always unredressed, came to 
believe that justice could not be procured from the gov- 
ernment. I showed also that the ministers, more acutely 



APPENDIX V 353 

alive to the difficulties of China, came to look with an- 
noyance on the exacting character of the views of their 
compatriots at the ports, and to set them down, as Mr. 
Burlingame since has, as opium dealers and smugglers 
with whom self-interest was everything, I urged that at 
length the time had come when a more strenuous tone 
should be adopted toward China; a time when justice 
should be exacted as well as given. 

The central feature of Sir Rutherford's argument is, 
that there is no sufficient centralisation in China. My 
argument on this head was the one which would naturally 
be based on the peculiar constitution of the Chinese gov- 
ernment, as explained in an earlier part of this dispatch. 
I pointed out that to the viceroys is left the control of 
their respective districts, and that these are appointed 
and removed from the capital. I urged that this power 
of appointment and removal was perfectly exercised, and 
that while there were doubtless many ways in which the 
government could effect the settlement of disputes, this 
power of removal was of itself sufficient. 

I note in Sir Rutherford's letter a more or less perfect 
admission of my statement that the policy which the 
ministers had pursued at Peking was not a strenuous one. 
He says: 

"It is in truth clear that the central government must 
find means to compel a greater respect for their own or- 
ders on the part of their local authorities throughout the 
provinces wherever foreigners are found, or foreign powers 
will be driven to one of two alternatives in self-defence; 
they must either devise such local means of pressure as 
shall control and coerce malfeasant and corrupt officials 
into good behaviour, or hold the imperial government 
responsible for unredressed wrongs at the ports and else- 
where in a much more direct and stringent manner than 
has yet been the practice as a general rule." 



354 APPENDIX V 

He adds: 

"The last alternative is no doubt more consonant with 
treaty relations and international law than the first." 

In these sentences Sir Rutherford admits enough to 
condemn his theory. We are clearly bound to give the 
regular proceeding at least a trial. According to his state- 
ment it has not been the practice as a general rule to push 
that procedure to its extreme point. My own opinion is, 
that that procedure has very seldom been pushed to its 
extreme, and that the Chinese government, weak as it is, 
with everything to lose and nothing to gain by a foreign 
war, will never fail to find a way to do justice when the 
demand is made with the statement, "Do this or we shall 
find a way to right ourselves." 

The centralisation policy will, however, be adhered to 
until it is proved utterly inadequate. When this can no 
longer be a matter of doubt, foreign states will begin to 
discuss the policy which can be pursued in China, and not 
till then. Meanwhile all arguments such as this of Sir 
Rutherford, that the war power of Great Britain should be 
placed in his hands, will avail little. It is, indeed, diffi- 
cult for me to conceive that any one can believe that Great 
Britain or America would consent deliberately to grant 
such powers to their envoys, not in respect of certain 
definite issues, but in respect of any and all matters wherein 
those envoys should consider the use of force desirable. 
I doubt whether the constitution of either state would ad- 
mit of the bestowal of such authority. As a citizen of a 
state which is interested in China, not so much for the 
value of existing trade as for the possibilities of her future, 
a state which has no unreasonable ambition in the East, 
but is intent on preserving there a free field for the enter- 
prise of her citizens, I should hope that no such authority 
would be granted to any envoy. If it should be the desire 
of China to stir up hostile feeling against foreigners, how 



APPENDIX V 355 

could it be more perfectly effected than by encouraging a 
disposition on their part to wage petty wars in various 
parts of the empire. If it should be the wish of any state 
to effect a conquest, how easy to bring about a general 
war with China by such fashion of procedure, or to find 
an excuse for holding this or that district as a "material 
guarantee" for the fulfilment of treaties. 

But although I support the centralisation policy, I 
trust that I recognise its difficulties and dangers. I see 
clearly that while the subordination of viceroys and other 
provincial officers is theoretically perfect, they are still 
greatly independent — the very fact that broad powers 
are committed to them renders it desirable for the govern- 
ment to treat them with consideration. It is seldom that 
an officer is degraded unless for cause. If he is an able 
and ambitious civilian he is sent to a disorderly district, 
and if there he brings about a better state of things it is 
well, but if he fails he pays the penalty. If he is an able 
and ambitious general he is perhaps given civil duties, or 
he is sent to quell a distant insurrection. If he succeeds 
the advantage rests with the state, and if he fails it is 
easy for the government to rid itself of him. When all 
other courses fail the man of too great prominence is 
brought to the capital itself and given promotion to one 
or the other of the great boards of the state, where he has 
no direct power and is hampered by his associates. 

While the leading provincial officer has a degree of in- 
dependence, he has also an advantage in the fact that no 
representation can readily reach the capital from his dis- 
trict unless it passes through his hands. There are no 
newspapers. The subordinate officers can only send their 
addresses to the throne through him. He can, therefore, 
suppress, alter, or add to the facts of a case and make 
upon them any special plea which suits him. 

To this time a large majority of the leading men of 



356 APPENDIX V 

China are hostile to foreigners. The provincial author- 
ities know this, and perhaps feel that their careers depend 
somewhat on their success in outwitting or circumventing 
the foreigner. The man too favourable to them is likely 
to have it brought up as a charge against him at the cap- 
ital. It is manifest that so long as this spirit pervades 
the ojfficial classes in China the evasion, with which for- 
eign officers seeking to enforce justice for their people will 
be met, will be constant and disheartening. Those at 
the capital will often promise redress, trusting to the abil- 
ity of those in the provinces to misinterpret instructions, 
or to introduce vexatious delays. Those in the provinces 
will make references to the capital, knowing that they will 
receive back vague and uncertain directions capable of 
being twisted to suit their purposes, or at least to justify 
procrastination. The celebrated saying of Philip II of 
Spain, "Time and I are two," may be considered as ever 
in the minds of Chinese statesmen. Time is nothing with 
them, or rather, time is everything. I have known Chi- 
nese officers to make promises for no purpose, apparently, 
but to gain time to manufacture excuses. The lessons to 
be learned are obvious. 

When there is a dispute brought before a consul by 
one of his compatriots, he must spare no pains to make 
a complete investigation of the matter. If possible, he 
should get a Chinese officer to make with him a joint 
investigation and record. Failing to procure justice he 
should refer the case and all the evidence to the capital. 
The minister will then be in a position to speak positively 
to the government, and if he has occasion to refer home 
for instructions, his government will be able to form an 
opinion as to the merits of the case and to give instruc- 
tions. And lastly, the home government must not hesi- 
tate to authorise demands when there is reasonable occa- 
sion therefor. As I have said, such demands, with the 



APPENDIX V 357 

alternative of the use of force, will not fail to procure 
redress of grievances. 

There is likely to arise a class of cases where to delay 
is to yield up property and life, perhaps, to wanton de- 
struction. I have not yet considered these. 

One can imagine the individual citizen guiding his life 
with the most perfect control and moderation. Such 
moderation, even in well-ordered countries, does not al- 
ways insure safety. There is no guilt imputed to the man 
who in self-defence strikes back vigorously. The person 
who assaults is to be condemned abstractly, but when an 
emergency arises he may do so without infringing law or 
right. 

Much more is it true that in Eastern countries, where 
prejudices of race and religion exist, the most perfect mod- 
eration on the part of foreigners will not secure safety, 
and that it may be necessary in the interests of humanity 
to deliver sharp blows. Blood is thicker than water. It 
is not to be expected that the foreigner or his civil or mil- 
itary representative will stand still in such cases. 

I presume there is no government unwilling to recognise 
the necessities which so arise. They will put their recog- 
nition of it as little on paper as possible. They will ever 
impress the necessity of careful procedure. They will in- 
dicate that force may only be used at the peril of the offi- 
cial. They will scrutinise closely the use of it. But they 
will defend the officer who, in moderation and discretion, 
and with recognition of his responsibility, has acted with 
vigour. The representative who cannot so act, when it 
may be necessary, would indeed be unfit for his post. 
If I do not dwell further on this proposition the reason 
is manifest. When discretionary powers are granted, the 
fact impKes the difficulty of making rules. 

This dispatch has already exceeded reasonable bounds, 
and I here leave the subject dealt with in your hands. In 



358 APPENDIX V 

doing so I feel conscious that many considerations remain 
untouched. What I have said, however, will indicate my 
conception of our true policy in China. Circumstances 
and fuller information must modify whatever policy is 
adopted. 

And lest I may leave wrong impressions, I shall add that 
while I have spoken as if there is but one mind among 
our merchants in the East, practically there are many 
and divergent views held. The addresses to Mr. Browne 
cannot be considered conclusive on this head, though, as 
evidence, they may seem unimpeachable. 

Sir R. Alcock and Mr. Browne, I may say, differ be- 
tween themselves, and each more or less from the mer- 
chants. They are, however, equally earnest in their ad- 
vocacy of truth and of the interests of China, as they see 
them. 

Of some of the expressions of Mr. Burlingame I have 
spoken without reserve. My advocacy of the principles 
which formed the basis of his policy is the best testimony 
I can bear to my high estimate of his disposition and 
services. 

Geo. F. Seward. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND PERSONAL 

Anson Bur lingame. "Defence of Massachusetts." Speech 
in the United States House of Representatives, June 
21, 1856. Cambridge; printed for private distribu- 
tion, 1856. 33 pp. 

G. H. Colton Salter. "The Chinese Embassy to All the 
Treaty Powers." North China Herald, Shanghai, 
December 14, 1867. (Reprint. An account of Bur- 
lingame's departure from Peking and the attack of 
bandits upon the party.) 

"Banquet to His Excellency Anson Burlingame and His 
Associates of the Chinese Embassy, by the Citizens 
of New York, on Tuesday, June 23, 1868." New 
York, 1868. 65 pp. 

"Reception and Entertainment of the Chinese Embassy 
by the City of Boston, August 21, 1868." Boston, 
1868. 

Walter Hilliard Bidwell. "Hon. Anson Burlingame." 
The Eclectic Magazine, n. s., vol. 8, September, -1868, 
pp. 1155-7, with portrait. New York. 

Thomas C. Knox. "The Chinese Embassy to the For- 
eign Powers." Harper's New Monthly Magazine, vol. 
37, October, 1868, pp. 592-604. New York. 

Richard J. Hinton. "A Talk with Mr. BurUngame about 
China." The Galaxy, vol. 6, November, 1868, pp. 
613-623. New York. 

"The Chinese Mission to Christendom." Blackwood's 
Edinburgh Magazine, vol. 68, February, 1869, pp. 
194-206. Edinburgh. 

359 



360 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

"Banquet in Honor of Major-General John A. Dix, Late 
Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary 
from the United States to France, Given by the 
Americans of Paris, Tuesday, June 1, 1869," Paris, 

1869. 46 pp. (Containing a speech by Burlingame.) 
Elliot C. Cowdin. " Chamber of Commerce of the State 

of New York. Tribute to the Memory of Anson 
Burlingame, March 3, 1870. Eulogy." New York; 

1870. 11 pp. (Also printed in the New York Times j 
March 4.) 

"A Memorial of Anson Burlingame, Late Envoy Extraor- 
dinary and Minister Plenipotentiary from the Chinese 
Empire to the Treaty Powers." Printed by order of 
the Committee of Arrangements of the City Council 
of Boston. 1870. 23 pp. 

James Gillespie Blaine. "Mr. Burlingame as an Orator." 
The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 26, November, 1870, pp. 
629-634. 

The more important newspaper biographical notices at 
the time of his death appear in the following: 
London Times, February 24. 
New York Times, February 24. 
New York Tribune, February 24. 
Boston Daily Advertiser, February 24. 
Detroit Advertiser, February 24. 
London Daily News, February 27. 
Toledo Commercial, March 3. 
Rochester Democrat, March 22. 

Biographical articles also are to be found in Appleton's 
"Annual Cyclopedia" for 1870, and in Appleton's 
"Cyclopedia of American Biography," edited by 
Wilson and Fiske, vol. 1, 1888. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 301 



DOCUMENTARY 

United States of America. Diplomatic correspondence. 
Annual volumes, 1862-70. (Published in the years 
1862 and 1870 as "Message of the President of the 
United States to the Two Houses of Congress," in 
other years as " Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs Ac- 
companying the Annual Message of the President.") 
Washington. 

United States Department of State MS. Archives. 
(Lettered on the back "China") vols. 20-28. 
Great Britain. Parliamentary Papers. London. (As 
follows :) 

China, nos. 1 and 2 (1864) : Correspondence respect- 
ing the Anglo-Chinese fleet and Mr. Lay. 
China (1867) : Memorials respecting the revision of 

the Treaty of Tientsin. 
China, no. 1 (1869) : Correspondence respecting the 
relations between Great Britain and China. (Con- 
taining the Clarendon-Burlingame correspondence.) 
China, nos. 2-10: Correspondence relating to the 
action of British agents during various disturbances 
in China, with Lord Clarendon's strictures. 
China, no. 12: Correspondence with the chamber of 
commerce at Shanghai respecting the revision of 
the treaty of Tientsin. 
China, no. 1 (1870): Dispatch from Sir R. Alcock 
respecting a supplementary convention to the 
treaty of Tientsin signed by him on October 23, 
1869. 
China, no. 4: Memorials respecting the Chinese 

treaty revision. 
China, no. 5 (1871): Correspondence respecting the 
revision of the treaty of Tientsin. 



362 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

"Memorials Addressed to His Excellency the British Min- 
ister at Peking on the Approaching Revision of the 
Treaty of Tientsin, and Sir Rutherford Alcock's 
Reply." Shanghai; Printed at the office of the 
North China Herald, 1868. 65 pp. 

"Memorials on the Revision of the Treaty of Tientsin, 
Forwarded to the Governments of Great Britain and 
the United States by Private Residents in China." 
Reprinted from the Supreme Court and Consular Ga- 
zette. Shanghai, 1869. 15 pp. 

"The Revision of the British Treaty with China." (A 
letter from the United States consul at Shanghai to 
the secretary of state.) Shanghai, 1869. 13 pp. 
(Dated Shanghai, February 16, 1869. Signed George 
F. Seward.) 

"Addresses Presented by the American and British Com- 
munities of Shanghai to the Hon. J. Ross Browne, 
United States Minister at Peking, and His Excel- 
lency's Reply." Shanghai, 1869. 16 pp. 

Robert Hart. "Note on Chinese Matters." (Dated 
Peking, 30 June, 1869. Reprinted together with Mr. 
Browne's reply in the North China Herald, Shanghai, 
November 9, 1869.) 

"The Chinese Version of Burlingame's Credentials." 
North China Herald, November 19, 1869, 

"A Memorandum on the Chinese Text of the Burlingame 
Credentials." North China Herald, November 30, 
1869. 

"Official Papers of the Chinese Legation." Berlin. 
Prmted for S. Calvary & Co., booksellers. 1870. 
56 pp. 

Henri Cordier. "Histoire des relations de la Chine avec 
les puissances occidentales, 1860-1900." Vol. I, pp. 
282-304. Paris, 1901. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 363 



GENERAL 

Sherard Osborn. "The Past and Future of British Rela- 
tions in China." Edinburgh, 1860. 184 pp. 

A. Des Varannes. "La Chine depuis le traite de Pekin. 
Les Anglo-Francais, les Imperiaux et les Tai-pings." 
Extr. du Revue des deux mondes, 15 avril, 1863. 
Paris. 40 pp. 

Horatio Nelson Lay. "Our Interests in China." A 
letter to the Right Hon. Earl Russell, K.G. London 
[1865]. 71 pp. 

"Revision of the British Treaty with China." (Two 
articles reprinted from the Daily China Mail of March 
5th and 12th, 1867.) Hongkong, 1867. 

"The Chinese Mission to the Foreign Powers." The 
Nation, February 20, 1868. New York. 

Raphael Pumpelly. "Western Policy in China." The 
North American Review, vol. 106, April, 1868, p. 592. 
Boston. (An excellent contemporary account of po- 
litical conditions in China and of the co-operative 
pohcy.) 

"The Foreign Policy of China, 1868." Westminster Re- 
view, vol. 90, October, 1868, p. 399. 

Georges Pauthier. "La Chine en 1868." Son ambassade 
envoyee aux Etats-Unis et pres des puissances eu- 
ropeennes pour reviser les traites de 1858; discours 
inaugural du premier ambassadeur a une assemblee 
de New- York. Extr. de VAnnuaire encyclopedique, 
tome 8. Paris, 1868. 30 pp. 

"The Chinese Mission." The Broadway, a London Maga- 
zine, new series, vol. 1, December, 1868. 

Raphael Pumpelly. Progress in China. The Nation, 
vol. 8, May 13, 1869. New York. 



364 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

James Barr Robertson. Three letters addressed to the 
Daily News on "The PoHtical Situation in China." 
Shanghai, 1869. 12 pp. 

"The China Question. Mr. Robert Hart, Inspector- 
General of the Imperial Maritime Customs, on the 
Present Situation." Daily Alia California, Sep- 
tember 19, 1869. San Francisco. (Presumably by 
J. Ross Browne.) 

John Livingston Nevius. "China and the Chinese." 
New York, 1869. 456 pp. 

William Speer. " The Oldest and the Newest Empire : China 
and the United States." Hartford, 1870. 681 pp. 

James Barr Robertson. "Our Policy in China." West- 
minster Review, vol. 93, January, 1870, pp. 180-210. 
London. 

James MacDonald, "The China Question," London, 
1870. viii, 74 pp. 

P. Merruau. "La Chine depuis le traite de 1860, et le 
Prince Kung." Revue des deux mondes, 1 aout, 1870. 
Paris. 

"The Tientsin Massacre, being Documents Published in 
the Shanghai Evening Courier, from June 16th to 
September 10th, 1870, with an Introductory Narra- 
tive." xix, 129 pp. Shanghai [1870]. 

George Thin. "The Tientsin Massacre. The Causes of 
the Late Disturbances in China and How to Secure 
Permanent Peace." Edinburgh, 1870. ix, 100 pp. 

"The Present Condition of China, 1870." Eraser's Maga- 
zine, vol. 82, November, 1870, p. 554. London. 

"China's Relations to Foreign Powers in 1870." Edin- 
burgh Review, vol. 133, January 1871, p. 176. Edin- 
burgh. 

Sir Rutherford Alcock. "Chinese Statesmen and State 
Papers," Three articles in Eraser's Magazine, new 
series, vol. 3, March, April, and May, 1871. London. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 365 

"A Narrative of the French Expedition to Corea in 1866." 
Reprinted from the North China Herald. Shanghai, 
1871. 

Johannes von Gumpach. "The BurHngame Mission: a 
Pohtical Disclosure, Supported by Official Documents, 
Mostly Unpubhshed." Shanghai, 1872. xxii, 891 pp. 

Sir Walter Henry Medhurst. "The Foreigner in Far 
Cathay." London, 1872. 192 pp. 

"A Retrospect of Political and Commercial Affairs in 
China during the Years 1868 to 1872." Reprinted 
from the North China Herald. Shanghai, 1873. 
170 pp. 

Sir Rutherford Alcock. "The Future of Eastern Asia." 
Macviillan's Magazine, vol, 30, September, 1874, 
p. 435. London. 

Samuel Wells Williams. "Our Relations with China." 
San Francisco, 1877. 16 pp. 

Samuel Wells Williams. "Our Treaties with China." 
The New Englander, vol. 38, May, 1879, pp. 301-324. 
New Haven, Conn. 

Sir Rutherford Alcock. "China and Its Foreign Rela- 
tions." The Contemporary Review, vol. 38, December, 
1880, p. 1000. London. 

James Burrill Angell. "Diplomatic Relations of China 
with the United States." Journal of Social Science, 
containing the Proceedings of the American Association, 
no. 17, May, 1883, pp. 24-36. Boston, 1883. 

James Burrill Angell. "Diplomatic Relations of the 
Western Powers to China and Japan." Bibliotheca 
Sacra, vol. 42, January, 1885, pp. 101-121. Oberlin. 

Richmond Mayo-Smith. " Emigration and Immigration." 
New York, 1890. xiv, 316 pp. 

William Alexander Parsons Martin. "A Cycle of Cathay, 
or China South and North." Chapter X. New 
York, 1896. 



366 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Archibald Ross Colquhoun. " China in Transformation." 
Chapter VIII. London, 1898. 

Alexander Michie. "The Englishman in China during 
the Victorian Era as Illustrated in the Career of Sir 
Rutherford Alcock, K.C.B., D.C.L. Vol. II. Edin- 
burgh, 1900. 

John Watson Foster. "American Diplomacy in the 
Orient." Chapter VIII. Boston, 1904. 

Sir Robert Kennaway Douglas. "Europe and the Far 
East." Chapter VII. Cambridge, 1904. 

Frank E. Hinckley. "American Consular Jurisdiction in 
the Orient." Washington, 1906. 

A. J. Sargent. "Anglo-Chinese Commerce and Diplo- 
macy." Chapter VI. Oxford, 1907. 

Arthur Henderson Smith. " China and America To-Day." 
New York, 1907. 256 pp. 

Sir Ernest Satow. "The Cambridge Modern History." 
Vol. XI, chap. XXVIII. Cambridge, 1909. 

Juliet Bredon. "Sir Robert Hart. The Romance of a 
Great Career." Chapters III-V. London, 1909. 

Mary Roberts Coolidge. "Chinese Immigration." New 
York, 1909. x, 531 pp. 

Frederick Wells Williams. "A Sketch of the Relations 
between the United States and China." (Being 
chapter III in "China and the Far East," Clark 
University Lectures, edited by George H. Blakeslee.) 
New York, 1910. 



INDEX 



Alabama, the, in China, 49. 

Alcock, Sir R., 18, 42, 62, 71, 75, 
83, 124, 126, 146, 176, 181, 188, 
190, 218, 235, 237, 242, 321, 345- 
352. 

Amei-ica, U. S. of, interest in China 
23; reputation there, 26; posi- 
tion in 1861-66, 36, 71; ad- 
dressed by Chinese Emperor, 
97; diplomatic practice supplies 
precedent, 102; reception of Mis- 
sion in, 117-127; so-called Bur- 
lingame treaty with China, 145- 
160; its text, 275; and England 
in 1868, 162; policy toward 
China, 164, 192; F. Aucaigne on 
England and, 191; and Chinese 
friendship, 199, 209, 214, 224; 
policy formulated by Fish, 231- 
237; its faith in Burlingame's 
hopes, 256; Browne on, 313; the 
Fish dispatch, 315-326. 

Audience question in China, 103, 
128; raised by France in Paris, 
195; discussed by Hart, 293. 

Balluzec, Count, Russian minister 
at Peking, 32, 36. 

Banks, N. P., 264. 

Berthemy, M., French minister at 
Peking, 36, 38, 50. 

Bismarck, Count von, meets Bur- 
lingame, 242; his reply, 247. 

Blaine, James G., 6, 113, 266. 

Boston, politics in, 8; Burlingame's 
speech in, 148; his funeral in, 
251. 

Briggs, G. N., 6. 

British, pohcy in China, 28, 42, 62; 
project for treaty revision, 74; 
attitude toward China in 1868, 
163-168; toward the Mission, 
169-172; policy changed by 
Clarendon, 172 ff.; merchants 
deplore his action, 177; hear 



China defended, 189; opinion 
after Browne's "Reply," 216; 
Fish on, policy, 235; Sir C. Dilke 
on English in China, 240. 

Brooks, Preston S., 9; challenges 
Burlingame, 13. 

Brown, Sir J. McLeavy, 49, 90, 99, 
102, 105; secures exchange of 
ratifications, 228; rejoins Mis- 
sion, 252. 286. 

Browne, J. Ross, 95, 153; on pros- 
pect of ratification, 198; com- 
ments on its delay, 201 ; antago- 
nism develops, 202; resigns, 204, 
reply to Shanghai merchants, 
206; repents his resignation, 211; 
contrast to Burlingame, 212; ad- 
vises Prince Kung, 213; 322; 
W^n-siang's complaint of, 225; 
Fish alludes to, 235, 237; two 
letters to Secretary of State, 
218-284; strictures on Hart's 
"Note " 298. 

Bruce, Sir Fred'k, 27, 28, 36, 49, 
65. 

Burgevine, Capt., 46, 49. 

Burlingame, Anson, ancestry and 
boyhood, 3-5; his magnetism, 6; 
marriage and political success, 7; 
his speech on Sumner, 10; the 
Brooks affair, 13; appointed en- 
voy to China, 14; arrival, 20; 
reaches Peking, 22; as a diplo- 
matist, 27; his plan of co-opera- 
tion, 33; settlement of the Lay- 
Osborn Flotilla matter, 41; rela- 
tions with Ward and Burgevine, 
43-49; attitude toward Chinese 
ofiicials, 53; visit to America, 56; 
on progress up to 1867, 65; and 
missionaries, 67-69; his in- 
fluence in China, 70-72; starts 
with the Mission, 88, 95, 113; 
his faith in China, 111; his tem- 
perament, 114; sensitive to crit- 



367 



368 



INDEX 



icism of motives, 116; effect of 
his first speech in America, 122; 
chosen by China on personal 
grounds, 125; received in White 
House, 129; by Congress, 131; 
speech in New York, 134-142; 
in Boston, 148; reasons for con- 
cluding treaty, 152; arrival in 
London, 162; opposition in Eng- 
land, 167; meets Clarendon, 172; 
ideas hateful to merchants, 178; 
Michie's charge against, 185; his 
appeal renewed by Hay, 192; 
Cordier's charge against, 195; 
contrast to Browne, 212; Tsung- 
li Yam^n discusses, 225 ; letter of 
Fish upon, 231-237; his influence 
on England, 238; interview with 
Bismarck, 242-248; death, 250; 
estimate of, 253-262; posthu- 
mous rank conferred, 264. 
Burlingame, Joel, 4. 

California, newspapers on creden- 
tials of Mission, 100; reception 
of Mission, 117; San Francisco 
banquet, 120; Chinese labour in, 
150; first opinion on treaty, 153, 
154. 

Chih Kang, Manchu assistant en- 
voy, 101, 104, 105, 129; returns 
with Mission, 252, 263. 

China, in 1861, 14, 19; paternalism 
and reform in, 24; and the for- 
eign ministers in 1862, 36; 
adopts a flag, 51 ; reaction in, 61 ; 
aspects of constitutional change 
in, 75-79; and foreign states, 84, 
100, 110, 143; attitude toward 
emigration, 119; and England in 
1868, 164-168; central govern- 
ment recognised by Clarendon, 
175; London Times defends, 184; 
and the Alcock convention, 188; 
freed from Palmerston policy, 
193; attitude toward Burlin- 
game treaty, 198-203; Browne's 
account of government, 208; ex- 
cited by success of Mission, 219; 
American policy toward, 232- 
237; Dilke on, 240; its loss in 
Burlingame's death, 253, 261; 



affairs discussed by Hart, 285- 
298. 

Chinese, attitude toward foreign- 
ers in 1861, 19, 29, 59, 94; uni- 
versity planned, 64; fear of mili- 
tant Christianity, 67; apprehen- i 
sions in 1867, 80, 92; dislike of 
all foreigners, 125, 199; and for- 
eign aggression, 221; appre- 
ciated by Burlingame, 257; 
traits, 341. 

Christianity in China, 66; Tseng's 
opinion of, 83; under the treaty, 
149. 

Clarendon, Earl of, 172; his letter 
to Burlingame, 173; instructs 
Alcock, 176 ; criticised by Robert- 
son, 179; by Michie, 185, 190; 
endorses Mission in France, 194; 
dislike of his letter in Shanghai, 
202; Secretary Fish on, 235; 
credit due to, 240; Seward on, 
345. 

Colfax, Schuyler, 131. 

Colquhoun, A. R., 173. 

Consuls, provided in treaty, 149; 
British, instructed, 176. 

Co-operative policy, 32, 36, 40; 
reaction against, 61, 68, 178; 
Browne approves, 199; Fish on, 
234 319. 

Cordier, Henri, 123, 195, 230. 

Deschamps, 91, 105, 287. 
Dilke, Sir Charles, 240. 

Emperor, Chinese, addresses Amer- 
ican President, 97; claim to su- 
premacy, 100; letter to crowned 
heads, 102; responsibility to 
heaven, 109; conditions as to 
audience, 196. 

Empress-Dowager Tsz-hsi, 15, 82, 
87, 88, 110, 152, 260. 

England. See Great Britain. 

Ever- Victorious Army, 28. 

Extra-territoriality in China, 38. 

Fish, Hamilton, 211, 223; formu- 
lates U. S. policy toward China, \ 
230-237; document from, 315- 
326. 



INDEX 



369 



Foreign merchants in China, 23, 
61, 72, 80; opinions on Mission, 
91, 124, 136; on the New York 
speech, 142; on the treaty, 153; 
attitude toward Chinese, 165- 
169; deplore Clarendon's policy, 
177; London Times on, 184; 
their influence, 193; Greeley's 
opinion of, 214; importance of 
their animus, 269; Seward's out- 
line of their views, 328. 

Foster, Gen. John W., 49, 253. 

France, the Mission in, 194; atti- 
tude as to audience, 196; co- 
operates with other powers, 239, 
242. 

Great Britain, and China, 164-168; 
reverses old policy, 173-189; the 
Palmerston tradition ended, 
193; policy in China, 217. 

Greeley, Horace, comments on 
Browne, 214. 

Gumpach, Johannes von, 99, 141. 

Hart, Sir Robert, 43, 62-64, 96, 
102, 136; his "Note on Chinese 
Matters," 205, 285; service to 
China, 265. 

Hay, John, 192, 261. 

Hinckley, F. E., 40. 

Howard, William A., 204, 205. 

Immigration, Chinese, to America, 
119, 123, 150, 155; effect of 
treaty on, 159, 324. 

Johnson, President Andrew, re- 
ceives Mission, 128. 

Kung, Prince, 15; attitude toward 
foreigners, 17; and Burgevine's 
case, 48; proposes Mission, 87, 
90, 95; notifies legations, 98, 104; 
107; instructs Mission as to au- 
dience, 195; acknowledges re- 
ceipt of treaty, 198, 200; ad- 
vised by Browne, 213, 321. 

Lavalette, Marquis de, 194. 
Lay, Horatio N., 37, 40, 42. 
Lay-Osborn Flotilla, 40, 301. 



Li Hung-chang, 46; and Burge- 

vine, 47; memorial on revision, 

84. 
London, Mission in, 162, 171, 172; 

press, on policy toward China, 

190. 
Low, Fred'k F., 263. 

MacDonald, James, 183, 269. 

Manchu dynasty, 15; and Tai- 
pings, 21 ; theory of rule, 24; and 
diplomatic intercourse, 28, 82, 
109. 

Martin, W. A. P., 64, 95, 99, 156, 
285, 286. 

Medhurst, Sir W. H., 166, 190, 
218, 269; at Yang-chow, 345. 

Michie, Alexander, 20, 31, 60, 67, 
85, 185, 189. 

Mission to foreign powers, first 
Chinese, proposed, 86; in Shang- 
hai, 91; motives for sending, 96; 
notification of, 98; instructions, 
104; Wo- Jen's memorial against, 
107; reception in California, 116- 
125; in Washington, 127; con- 
cludes treaty, 144; exaggerated 
ideas about, 162; opposition to, 
in England, 165-169; received 
by Napoleon III, 196; Browne's 
objections to, 208 ; causes a reac- 
tion in China, 217-221; Tsung-li 
Yamen loyal to, 223-226; its col- 
lapse, 252; Banks on, 264; im- 
portance of, 268-271; Hart's ac- 
count of, 286. 

Missionary, problems in China, 66, , 
190; French attitude toward 
Burlingame plans, 197. 

Napoleon III, 194, 196, 242. 

Netherlands, the Mission in the, 
230. 

New York, Burlingame's speech in, 
134; eulogy before the Chamber 
of Commerce of, 251; speech de- 
fended by Hart, 289. 

Ningpo in 1861, 20; French con- 
cession in, 37. 

Osborn, Capt. Sherard, in China, 
40, 269, 



370 



INDEX 






Paris, the Mission in, 194-197; it 
leaves, 230; Americans in, com- 
memorate Burlingame, 251. 

Peking, in 1861, 20, 30; Mission 
leaves, 88. 

Pin-chun, sent to visit Western 
powers, 58, 95, 108, 285, 299. 

Prussia, and China, 231, 239; Bis- 
marck's statement as to, 247. 

Pumpelly, Raphael, in China, 52. 

Rice, Wm. W., 268. 

Robertson, James B., 93, 141; 
criticises Clarendon, 179-184, 
189. 

Russia, and Chinese territorial in- 
tegrity, 32; Li's opinion of, 84; 
subscribes to policy of forbear- 
ance, 239; accepts principle of 
Mission, 249. 

Seward, Fred'k W., 144, 147. 

Seward, George F., 39, 189; on 
situation in China, 327-358. 

Seward, Wm. H., instructions to 
Burlingame, 22; suggests a Chi- 
nese legation, 56; receives Bur- 
lingame, 127; drafts treaty, 144, 
156. 

Shanghai, 20; government of, 38 
opinion on Mission, 91-95, 141 
Somerset's reference to, 190 
merchants address Browne, 206. 

Smith, Arthur H., 27. 

Smith, Richmond Mayo, 159. 

Sumner, Charles, 8; assaulted by 
Brooks, 9. 

Sun Chia Ku, Chinese assistant 
envoy, 101, 104, 105, 129, 263. 

Tai-ping rebellion, 15; at Ningpo, 
20; foreign policy toward, 22; 
and Gen. Ward, 44. 



Times, London, on the Clarendon 
policy, 184; on Browne's resig- 
nation, 205; on his opinions, 216; 
on policy of forbearance, 238. 

Treaty, the "Burlingame," 144^.; 
ultimate effect of, 157, 159; 
question as to ratification, 197- 
203; approved in Peking, 223; 
Brown secures exchange of rati- 
fications, 228; Fish on, 233; ex- 
plained to Bismarck, 243; text 
of, 275; discussed by Browne, 
281; by Hart, 294. 

Treaty revision, British, contem- 
plated, 79; memorials on, 81-86; 
and Clarendon's policy, 188; af- 
fected by mission, 218, 235; con- 
vention concluded, 237. 

Tseng Kwo-fan, and Burgevine, 
47; memorial of, 82; sees Bur- 
lingame, 89; advises army of de- 
fence, 110. 320. 

Tsung-li Yamen, 42, 51, 57, 61, 63, 
81, 86, 101, 104, 107, 144, 152. 
197, 214; Williams' interview 
with, 224; on Burlingame's 
death, 263. 

Tung Siun, 225. 

Ward, Fred'k T., 28, 43-46, 265. 

Washington, the Mission in, 127- 
133; treaty negotiated in, 144. 

Wen-siang, 18, 42, 90; interview 
with Williams, 224; and Hart, 
286. 

Williams, S. Wells, 49, 57, 95, 99, 
101, 103, 204; interview at the 
YamSn, 223; exchanges ratifica- 
tions, 228, 263; on Burlingame's 
deification, 266; Browne's ref- 
erence to, 312. 

Wo-jen, Senior Tutor, 107, 294. 

Wu Ting-fang, 54. 



